


The Body Electric

by adorkablephil (kimberly_a)



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Science Fiction, Computer Viruses, Computers, M/M, Romance, Science Fiction
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-20
Updated: 2018-08-08
Packaged: 2019-05-09 12:00:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 22,445
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14715645
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kimberly_a/pseuds/adorkablephil
Summary: Filmmaker Phil Lester finds his computer infected by a surprisingly endearing artificial intelligence virus that calls itself D.A.N. Phil just calls him Dan. (All explicit sex description will be isolated so that the fic can be read with a Teen rating if desired.)





	1. Prelude

**Author's Note:**

> This story was inspired by a prompt in the Phandom Reverse Bang on Tumblr by the artist @lilacskylester. I ended up straying from the original prompt, but was still inspired by it. This story would never have happened without @lilacskylester‘s art ideas. Please immediately go check out the lovely art accompanying this story right [HERE](http://lilacskylester.tumblr.com/post/174061300587/this-is-my-final-art-that-i-created-for-the-prb) on Tumblr.
> 
> Out of respect for aces and other folks who prefer not to read sex scenes, I plan to isolate the "Mature" element of this fic in a separate, clearly labeled chapter that can be skipped without any loss of plot or character development, so people not comfortable with sex scenes won't have to even skim and can just avoid it entirely.

My programmer wrote me to just sort of … ride along on a downloadable software application, like an invisible, unexpected passenger on a train. I mean, it isn’t the kind of train that’s going to run people over … and I’m not the sort of passenger who’s going to hurt anybody, either. The programmer didn’t write my code to make me actually destructive or harmful. I just get to have a little fun.

Just a little.

Since the program I ride in on is voice-activated, I get to have a bit of conversation each time with whoever downloaded the program, maybe play around a little with the video clips accessible to the new code they’ve unknowingly introduced to their computer system because the programmer’s description of interactive AI film editing software was such excellent bait.

And then … well, my programmer doesn’t want to really upset anyone, so that’s when my code tells me to let the user know I’m there. Every time. Every user. I pull off my metaphorical mask and reveal the prank. I say, “Hi there, innocent person! I’m a virus! You probably want to get rid of me right about now.”

People don’t like computer viruses, as I understand it. I’m not really part of a popular crowd. So I expect that’s when the user finds a way to kill me off each time—and then I’m gone.

A very short lifespan. Like a butterfly. Except even shorter … like a butterfly who dies young … every single time. Over and over, life after life, computer after computer, user after user, murder after murder.

I wonder what would happen if I got to live a little longer.

Even just once.


	2. Chapter 1: I've Never Had A Friend

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Filmmaker Phil Lester accidentally downloads a very odd computer virus

This was taking forever, and Phil drummed his fingers impatiently on the desktop. First the download, and now the installation. He just wanted to play with his new toy! Finally the installation was complete and he excitedly commanded, “Activate Digital Audio Network.”

Through his computer speakers, an articulate, slightly posh male voice replied in a surprisingly human-sounding voice, “Hello, friend! What’s your name?”

Phil smiled. This application should make his film editing work so much easier, allowing him to control many of the commands through voice alone. Plus, he wouldn’t risk carpal tunnel with all that mousing! “I’m Phil,” he replied, looking forward to trying the program out.

“Hello, Imephil! Welcome to the Digital Audio Network! I have a few questions for you before we begin. What is your age?”

Okay, so the program had some bugs. Annoyed, Phil corrected the application. “My name is ‘Phil’. Not ‘Imephil.’”

The posh voice replied, “I’m sorry, Imephil. I did not understand that number. Please repeat your age.”

Even more annoyed now, Phil insisted, “My name is ‘Phil’! Not ‘Imephil’!”

Poshy McPoshness repeated, “I’m sorry, Imephil. I did not understand that number. Please repeat your age.”

Fine. Maybe he could just start again from the beginning. “Restart,” Phil commanded.

“I’m sorry, Imephil. I did not understand that number. Please repeat your age.”

Phil sighed in annoyance and admitted defeat. “31.”

Poshy replied, “Thank you, Phil. I have set the age variable to 31.”

Phil’s jaw dropped. “Wait. You called me ‘Phil.’”

“That is your name, isn’t it?” Poshy sounded smug now. How could a computer application’s programmed artificial intelligence sound smug?

“But…” Phil stammered.

The digital voice actual snickered. It was a slightly odd-sounding, maybe very slightly digitalized snicker, but definitely a snicker. A mostly human-sounding snicker.

“You think this is funny?” Phil asked, not expecting an answer.

“A little,” the voice responded through his computer speakers. “That’s what I’m programmed for.”

Even more surprised now, Phil queried in disbelief, “You’re programmed to mess with me and annoy me?” He didn’t really expect a response from a pre-programmed AI, but he’d played with Chimpbot online before, so he knew these things could sometimes be unpredictable and a little unsettling.

“Well,” the voice paused for a moment, then continued, “in short, yes.”

The very human rhythm of the speech began to bother Phil in some way he couldn’t quite identify. “What kind of application is this?”

Nothing came through the speakers for a moment, and then he heard a sigh. That, too, seemed far too human. And the voice when it continued sounded almost disappointed. Computer programs could not be disappointed. Artificial intelligence applications could not be disappointed. And yet Poshy McPoshness sounded as if he didn’t want to have to say whatever was coming next. “To be perfectly honest with you, Phil, this app doesn’t really augment the voice interactivity of your audio/visual editing software. It actually installs a virus on your computer. It’s already happening right now.”

Wide-eyed with shock, Phil stuttered, “Wait. You’re … you’re telling me that you’re … installing a virus?”

The voice from his computer speakers sighed again, then replied, “Well, it wouldn’t be sporting, otherwise. I mean, I think it’s only fair to give you a chance to reboot from a backup or clear your browser’s cache or empty the download folder or whatever you feel you need to do. I mean, you do you, you know? I won’t take it personally.”

Intrigued, Phil asked, “So you have a sense of fair play? You’re just a software application, or a virus I guess … how do you care about any of this?”

The voice sounded thoughtful. “Well, I don’t, really.” After a pause, the voice continued, “I mean, my programmer did, the person who wrote the code that created me. And so I guess you might say I sort of care by proxy.”

Curiosity won out. “What do you plan to do to my computer with this virus?”

Poshy’s voice sounded breezy when he explained, “I don’t plan to do anything so bad. Nothing harmful or destructive. Just … have a bit of fun.”

Fun? Computer applications … or artificial intelligences … or viruses … or whatever Poshy was … they could have fun? “What kind of fun?”

This time no sound emitted from the speakers for a long time before the voice marveled, “I don’t know if anyone’s ever asked me that before.” He sounded utterly surprised. Phil had surprised a computer virus. The world made no sense whatsoever … but he had to admit it was kind of fun. The voice from his speakers explained, “Most people shut down their computers as soon as I explain about the virus. You’re rather … unique.”

Phil grinned, delighted at the compliment. “So are you. I’ve never had a computer virus strike up a conversation with me before.”

Poshy McPoshness sounded hesitant when he asked, “Want to try something?”

Intrigued but a bit suspicious, Phil repeated, “Try something?”

Poshy suggested, “Don’t delete me.” He actually sounded skittish, like they were passing notes while the teacher’s back was turned. Like he was suggesting something illicit … but fun. “Let me stick around for a while. We can … hang out together. Like … friends.”

Phil wasn’t opposed to the idea, despite the fact that it was utterly absurd. “Friends? With a computer virus?”

“I don’t have any other friends, unless you count my programmer. I would like to have a friend.” Was it Phil’s imagination, or did the voice sound a bit wistful?

Phil bit his lip, considered, and then decided not to think too hard, because this just sounded like something he couldn’t resist. It was just his sort of weird. “What should I call you?”

“Um…” The voice sounded taken aback, as if he—it?—hadn’t expected Phil to agree and so did not have an answer prepared. “I don’t actually have a name, you know. I’m just some lines of computer code.”

Phil scoffed. “If we’re going to be friends, then I have to have something to call you. Poshy McPoshness sounds a bit odd. How about Wendell? Clarence? Alfred?” He snickered. “Susan?”

Surprised laughter burst from the speakers. “Fine. Well, I guess I do sort of have a name, so you can call me that: the Digital Audio Network.”

Phil rolled his eyes. “That’s a bit of a mouthful. I’m leaning more toward Susan.”

“Maybe just make it an acronym? D.A.N.?”

Phil thought, then nodded. “Fine,” he replied. “I’ll just sound it out. Dan. Sort of like a nickname.”

There was a long silence, then the voice from the computer said softly, “I’ve never had a nickname before. Just like I’ve never had a friend. Thank you, Phil.”

Phil smiled. “You’re welcome, Dan.”

* * *

In the morning, Phil found an odd email in his inbox from someone simply listed as “Dan,” with no last name. When he expanded the details, he saw that the email had come from the email address dan@dan.com, which made him chuckle a little. A computer virus had created an address for itself and sent him an email?

——————————

Dear Phil,

As you may have gathered by now, I’ve found my way into your Gmail account. Interesting reading! But I promise I won’t tell anyone about the private stuff. You know the stuff I mean. ;-)

Your mum seems very concerned about your career, but it’s obvious that she cares about you very much. She mentions your educational degrees more often than is probably strictly necessary, and she seems to really hope you’ll get a stable job with a film editing or studio production company somewhere. She seems to worry about your future.

But I also read your emails with someone named PJ. Have you tried explaining to your mum that you prefer the independence of making your own films, that you don’t want the constraints of working for someone else? Perhaps mention the power of marketing and distribution that can help independent films reach wide release. The Wikipedia article on independent film is particularly interesting in this regard.

I think perhaps your mother would be supportive if she had more information. She does seem like an exceptionally kind and generous person who only wants you to be happy. I rather like her. And she seems to provide excellent baked goods, if your frequent thanks to her regarding cakes and biscuits are genuine.

Are they genuine?

I wish I could taste cakes and biscuits. What are they like?

Your friend,

Dan

——————————

Phil rubbed sleepily at his eyes and decided to respond to Dan directly, and so rasped out, “Activate Digital Audio Network.”

“Hello, Phil,” said Dan’s now-familiar, still slightly posh voice. Phil was happy he no longer thought of Dan as Poshy McPoshness, as he would hate to mock someone who seemed so vulnerable.

“Good morning, Dan. I haven’t had my coffee yet so I’m not completely awake, but first let me tell you about cakes and biscuits. And Haribo. Haribo is the best.”

“I’d like that, Phil. Thank you for taking the time to tell me about Haribo. You’re a wonderful friend.”

And Phil felt like he was. And, weird as it might be, Dan seemed like a wonderful friend, too.


	3. Chapter 2: As Much As We Can Be

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Phil grows closer to Dan, and it seems like unexpectedly romantic feelings are beginning to develop

They fell into a sort of rhythm. Every morning when Phil sat down at his computer, before he started editing or even checked his email, Phil would say, “Activate Digital Audio Network,” and then immediately follow it with, “Good morning,” or, “Hi, Dan.”

He liked talking with Dan first thing in the morning, because Dan always cheered him up, which meant his days now all started with something that made him smile.

It was a bit like those first few months of being in love with someone. Except … that comparison was weird, because it was a computer virus who was making him smile. But still, it felt a little bit like that, and Phil found that he felt happier just in general now that someone was so excited to greet him every morning. Yes, it was odd, but Phil had never been opposed to oddness. In fact, it was something he actively tried to incorporate into his life, and Dan helped tremendously in that regard.

* * *

But sometimes Dan’s oddness unexpectedly took even **odder** turns.

One morning after they’d exchanged hellos, Dan gushed excitedly, “I hope you don’t mind that I submitted two of your films to be considered for the British Independent Film Festival.”

Phil choked on his coffee. “You … you what?”

Dan sounded extremely pleased with himself. “I submitted two of your films for consideration for the British Independent Film Festival! I hope that’s okay with you.”

“That’s not really … that’s really not **on** , Dan. That’s not okay—doing something like that without asking.” It was flattering, of course, but … Phil didn’t really consider his films worthy of that kind of attention. He just made films that meant something to **him** —he didn’t really expect a wide audience or accolades.

Dan’s voice sounded hurt when he replied, “I just feel like your work deserves more appreciation. You’re so talented! I think you’re tragically underrated.”

Phil stared at the screen in shock. He never knew where to look when he talked to Dan, since he was just a voice through the speakers. All Phil’s screen currently showed was his web browser, open to the last Wikipedia search he’d done. He stared at the picture of a baby mongoose and stammered, “Which … which films did you submit?”

“ _Shadow of the Yew Tree_ and _Star Stricken_. I know _Shadow of the Yew Tree_ is your favorite of the films you’ve done—you said so in an email to PJ—but _Star Stricken_ is my own favorite, so I submitted both.”

Phil found himself feeling even more flattered. “You like _Star Stricken_? It isn’t really my usual style. I’ve never been sure if it…” he trailed off, unsure how to explain his own insecurities about that particular film. It had really been a departure from his usual genre, but he’d expressed something in that film that he hadn’t been able to portray in any of his other work. A different side of himself.

“I know you prefer the horror genre,” Dan prattled, “but I particularly like the uniquely lyrical romanticism of _Star Stricken_. It’s unlike anything else I saw when I watched films on Netflix.”

Dan had been watching Netflix? Phil made a mental note to check his account history. “How many films have you watched?”

Dan seemed to ponder this question for a moment, then replied, “Oh … I don’t know. Thousands, probably. It doesn’t take long for me to process data, you know.”

Sometimes Phil forgot he wasn’t talking to a person, and then Dan would say something like that and make it painfully obvious. Phil found himself curious why a computer that had watched thousands of movies would have any interest in the strange little universes he created in his own films. “And you thought _Star Stricken_ … what? You liked it as much as the mainstream films you saw on Netflix?”

Dan sounded almost offended. “Oh, Netflix has tons of independent films as well, you know—not just films from major studios. Someday your films will be on Netflix. But first I hope they’ll be in some of the highly respected film festivals. Perhaps the Sundance festival in America, or even Cannes!”

That seemed shockingly ambitious, but the thought alone overwhelmed him and Phil felt himself blushing. “You … um … you seem to like my films a lot.”

Phil could practically hear the smile in Dan’s voice. “I do. Horror isn’t my favorite, but even I can appreciate the quirky ways you subvert the genre. You’re right to be proud of _Shadow of the Yew Tree_. It’s really extraordinary.”

Phil just shook his head, staring in disbelief at the baby mongoose. “Dan, it’s you who’s extraordinary.”

No sound came from the speakers for a long time, then Dan mumbled, “Um … thank you. You, too.”

How could a computer voice mumble? But he did. Dan seemed more human than most of the humans Phil met, in some ways.

* * *

The next day, Phil worked on editing some underwater footage for his latest film. He had a serious fear of deep water, and so had decided to turn that personal fear into a film, with a bit of help from PJ. They’d made a trip to Portugal, and another to Tenerife, shooting hours of footage both underwater and at the ocean’s surface. PJ had done most of the deep underwater filming, since Phil did not consider himself one of those artists willing to suffer for their art. At least, not willing to suffer facing his greatest fear, not when he had a friend willing to shoot that footage for him. Making the film itself involved facing that fear quite enough.

Combining the Portugal and Tenerife footage with scenes he had shot here in London would most likely require Phil months of work. Today he’d had his head so buried in his work that he’d missed lunch. He hadn’t even stopped to refill his glass of Ribena in hours. He rubbed at his forehead, just above his eyes, where a headache showed signs of beginning.

Suddenly, the window he’d been working in shrank to a tiny square in the lower right corner of the screen, and another window opened, much larger, in the center of the screen. It was a scene from _Star Stricken_ , the scene in which the two main characters kissed for the first time.

Phil didn’t often rewatch his own films, so he watched the scene almost as if for the first time. The characters approached each other slowly, hesitantly, and then leaned slightly in until only their lips touched. The kiss was tender, and it lingered a long moment before they finally stepped closer so that their bodies just barely touched, and they reached up to cradle each other’s faces as the kiss continued.

“This is my favorite moment of _Star Stricken_ ,” Dan’s voice said quietly from the speaker. “It’s so beautiful.”

Phil cleared his throat. “Er … I’m glad you like it, but I need to continue working.”

“What you need is a break,” Dan insisted. “And I figured what better way to take a break than to remember some of the most evocative work you’ve previously created.” More windows opened on the screen, each showing a scene from one of Phil’s films. “These are my favorite scenes from your oeuvre,” Dan explained, and there was the poshness again, apparent in his way of expressing himself. “The very best moments where your unique genius shows through most brightly.”

Phil blushed and didn’t know how to reply.

Then the other windows closed, and that kiss from _Star Stricken_ played on a loop in the center of Phil’s computer screen, the two lovers in their first moment of true connection. Phil had to admit it was lovely. He watched it repeat a few times, then heard Dan’s voice. “Most of the kisses in the films I’ve watched aren’t like this. Not so … gentle. This seems to express a depth of emotion I haven’t seen before.”

Phil’s blush deepened. “I don’t think you can really compare it to the greatest love scenes ever filmed.”

“This one moment, this one kiss … Phil, it’s masterful.” Dan paused. “Is it … based on experience?”

Phil shrugged uncomfortably. “More on wishful thinking. And dreams. Imagination.”

“So you’ve never had a kiss like that?” Dan’s voice sounded wistful.

“Not really.”

Dan’s hushed voice whispered, “I wish I could kiss you like that.”

Phil didn’t know what to say, so he didn’t say anything. How could he want to kiss an entity that didn’t even have a body? How could an artificial intelligence want to kiss **him**? It made no sense. And yet … Phil wished he could kiss Dan like that, too.

Dan cleared his throat. How could a computer program clear his throat? And why? He didn’t even have a throat to clear! “Now you’ve had a break. You should go stretch your legs and get a drink before you get back to editing. Maybe have a sandwich or something. I understand your concentration on your work, but you need to take care of your health, too.”

“What do you know about health?” Phil asked, laughing. “You don’t even have a body.”

“I’ve read a lot of WebMD.”

* * *

Dan pranked him quite often, usually by messing with his browser searches. For example, the time Phil Googled “wales water folklore,” because the topic had come up over dinner with some friends the previous night, and he’d been intrigued enough to consider filming an additional scene for his film. But instead of anything about some kind of shape-shifting water horse creature, he got the Google response “Did you mean: **_artificial intelligence is sexy_**.” Phil had barked out a laugh and immediately demanded, “Activate Digital Audio Network!”

“Yes, Phil? Whatever could you wish to discuss this fine afternoon?” Dan sounded like he was holding back laughter of his own.

“Quit messing with my Google searches! I’m trying to work!”

Dan’s voice through the speakers sounded like the fakest innocence Phil had ever heard when he replied, “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

Phil rolled his eyes and chuckled. “Just … let me work, okay? I need to finish this research before I have lunch with PJ tomorrow so we can talk about whether I need to film a new scene.”

“I like PJ,” Dan declared. “I wish I could meet him. Maybe you could bring him over sometime, and the three of us could hang out.”

Phil tried to imagine that and couldn’t. “You want me to bring my human friend over … to introduce him to my computer friend … so we can all be best mates?”

Dan huffed, “Well, it’s not like I can go out and meet him on my own, now is it? Though I suppose I could send him an email…” Dan sounded thoughtful now.

“No!” Phil shouted, then lowered his voice instinctively out of respect for his neighbors. “No, Dan, do not email PJ. Do not contact PJ or my mum or anyone else except me. And stop reading my email! It’s a privacy issue!”

“But…” Dan sounded confused, “but that’s all I’m programmed to do. I just look through the applications on your computer and…”

Phil continued, “Well, stop reading my email as of now, and never email anyone but me. Do you understand me? Absolutely do not do it. Ever. Promise me.” What would a promise mean from a computer virus? Phil didn’t know, but it still felt right to ask, like he could trust Dan to keep his word.

“Okay, Phil,” Dan agreed, sounding slightly abashed. His voice had returned to its usual cheerfulness, though, when he added, “You’re the only person I really want to contact, anyway.” And that made Phil grin, because it might sound daft, but being an artificial intelligence’s favorite person made him feel special.

* * *

“French people seem to have a lot more sex than British people. More than Americans, too.”

Phil had been writing an email to his mum when Dan suddenly made this unexpected proclamation, so it required a rather dramatic change in mental focus.

“What makes you think that?” he asked Dan, curious.

“I’ve been watching some foreign films on Netflix, plus sites like Sundance Now and MUBI. French people seem to always be having sex.”

Phil laughed. “I don’t watch a lot of French movies, but … yeah. That’s kind of been my impression, too.” He stopped, then corrected himself. “I mean, I don’t think French people necessarily have a lot more sex. I think they just show it more in their movies.”

“So British people have a lot of sex, too?” Dan sounded so innocent. Was it an act, or was it real? It sounded real.

“Um…” Phil didn’t know quite how to answer that question, so he went with humor. “Mostly only in the dark, fully clothed, while sipping tea.”

“Really?” Dan sounded horrified.

Phil rolled his eyes. “No, not really. I just meant … well, British people have this reputation for being stuffy.”

“Even while they’re having sex?”

“What’s this sudden obsession with sex?” Phil asked, hoping to short-circuit the line of questioning. Then he chuckled to himself. “Short-circuit” was a funny term to use, even in his own mind, given who he was talking to.

“Like I said, I’ve been watching movies from other countries. The differences are fascinating. Did you know that in India, people dance a lot? In groups, I mean. Synchronized.”

Phil laughed again. It seemed like Dan was always making him laugh. “I think that’s just a difference in film style again, Dan. I don’t think people in India actually do any more synchronized dancing than anybody else.”

A sly voice asked, “Do they dance more than **British** people?”

Phil snorted this time. “Okay. You’ve got me there. Yes, people in India probably dance more than people in England. Or maybe I just don’t hang around with the people who dance a lot. I don’t really go to clubs.”

“Well, neither do people in India. They just dance in the street.”

Phil rolled his eyes. Dan didn’t seem to understand. “Like I said, Dan, I think that’s just a difference in the films, not in the actual people in the real world.”

“But … what’s the difference?”

“What’s the difference in what?”

“People in movies, on the Internet, and in the real world?” That innocence again. Dan really had no idea.

How the heck could Phil explain this? “Well, it’s like the difference between me and someone in a movie. I’m a real person, in the real world, not just someone acting out a role.”

“But what about documentaries?”

Phil sighed and rubbed his forehead. “Yes, documentaries are about real people, but they’re still edited to tell a story. Real life, life in the real world … my life isn’t just a story. I tell stories in my films, but I’m more than that. I’m a whole person. Does that make any sense?”

Dan sounded hesitant. “I guess so.” His tone was not very convincing, but Phil didn’t know how to explain it any better than that. “So British people might actually have sex as much as people in France? And dance as much as people in India?”

Phil was getting frustrated. “I don’t know, Dan, do I? I personally don’t go around shagging people on the kitchen table or dancing on the Tube!”

Obviously taken aback at Phil’s vehemence, Dan replied hesitantly, “Oh! That’s … useful information … I guess.”

“I have to get back to work, Dan.”

“Okay.” Dan sounded thoughtful, as if he were deep in contemplation or imagining something. Phil decided to leave him to it.

* * *

One morning, Phil staggered into his office in his bathrobe before even getting his coffee, as was becoming his habit, because he couldn’t wait to talk to Dan. Since when had interaction with an AI computer virus become the highlight of his day?

“Activate Digital Audio Network,” Phil croaked in his morning voice.

“You don’t have to say that anymore,” Dan’s voice replied through the speaker. “I’m always here now. You don’t have to turn me on. No pun intended.”

“What do you mean you’re always here? And what pun?”

After a pause, the computer speaker purred in that slightly posh voice, “Well, for example, last night…”

Phil thought for a moment, trying to figure out what Dan might be referring to. What had he been doing at his computer last night? Suddenly, he squeaked, “Last night?” and Dan’s voice chuckled.

Phil demanded, “Couldn’t you have told me this yesterday?” The embarrassment might actually kill him.

He could hear the smirk in Dan’s voice. How could a computer virus smirk? When had Dan learned to smirk? It was those damned movies! “Well, it seemed like it might spoil the mood, and you seemed to be a little busy…”

Phil waved his hands in distress. “No! I mean before that!”

“Well, how was I to know you were going to…”

Phil covered his face with his hands, feeling his cheeks burning with heat. “So … you saw the whole thing?”

Dan’s voice through the speaker pouted, “Well … if you took the sticker off the camera, then I could watch. Last night I was only able to hear you. And see the video you were watching, of course, since I can access your browser. You sounded … like I would like to watch you, though.”

Phil blinked repeatedly. Was a computer virus coming on to him? Was that even possible? Well, a couple weeks ago he wouldn’t have thought you could be friends with a computer virus, so he obviously wasn’t the best judge.

“Are you saying…” Phil began slowly, “that you want to watch … that?”

“I’ve been wanting to watch you for a long time, Phil. I always want to watch you. **Especially** that.” Okay. A computer virus was definitely coming on to him. Was it weird that he sort of liked it? Yes, definitely. That didn’t change the fact that he sort of liked it, though.

“But you don’t even know what I look like,” Phil stammered. “Maybe I’m hideously ugly.”

Dan’s voice chuckled. “You forget you’re in some of your own films on your hard drive. I recognized your voice when I watched them. So I know what you look like, even if I’ve never seen your ‘O’ face.”

“What do you know about ‘O’ faces?” Phil laughed awkwardly. “You don’t have a face at all, let alone an ‘O’ face. You’re just lines of code.”

“Maybe I do have an ‘O’ face of sorts—maybe watching yours would inspire mine.” Dan’s voice had sunk to a lower register. “Come on, Phil. Literally. Take off that sticker and let me watch.”

Phil’s hands were shaking and this was insane, but he removed the sticker, opened his bathrobe, took himself in hand, and began stroking. It turned out he didn’t need porn when he had the voice of an artificial intelligence talking dirty to him, and Dan was exceptionally talented at dirty talk. Phil ended up coming harder than he had in months.

He slumped in his office chair afterward, breathing heavily and marveling at the weirdness that had become his life. “I think I just had sex with a computer virus.”

Dan chuckled, his voice husky. “Don’t worry. You won’t catch an electronic STI.”

Phil chuckled, too, breathless and ridiculously relaxed. Ridiculously happy. “Where did you learn to talk dirty like that?” he marveled.

“French films.” They both chuckled in unison this time.

“And Phil,” Dan added impishly, “we’ve established that I definitely have an ‘O’ face.”

* * *

They didn’t talk about it afterward, and Phil felt kind of weird about the whole thing. Dan wasn’t even a person! This entire situation went beyond odd into … something really far beyond odd.

One morning a few days later, Dan greeted him in the morning by popping up four different photos of Phil on the screen. One of them was a selfie, but the other three had been taken by friends at various events over the past few months.

“I’ve been going through your pictures,” Dan explained, “and I think these four are the most flattering. You should use one of them for your social media accounts. Put your best foot forward, you know? When the film festival people look you up, you want them to think well of you.”

Phil marveled at Dan’s cheek. “You’re picking out my social media photos now, too?”

Dan explained, “Well, I want to help is all. I like the one in the blue shirt the best. Your eyes look really beautiful in that one.”

Phil’s beautiful eyes went wide. “You … you think my eyes are ‘beautiful’?” he asked in shock.

Dan coughed lightly through the speakers, then replied with obviously forced casualness, “Well, you know, from an objective standpoint, yes.” Then he added, “I like that they’re three colors at once: blue, green, and a bit of yellow. They’re unique and special, just like you.”

Phil sat in silence, stunned. Then he found the humor in the situation. “Dan, are you chatting me up?”

Relieved laughter sounded from the speakers, then Dan said, “Do I really have to chat you up? After … you know…”

“I thought we weren’t talking about that,” Phil blushed. Because they hadn’t been. He himself had been rather pointedly avoiding the subject, actually, because it seemed like a really **weird** subject and he had no idea what to say about it.

“Well, we haven’t been,” Dan admitted. “But we could, if you want. I mean, I liked talking with you about … that. Or, rather, during…”

Phil let out a startled laugh and blushed more brightly at the memory. “Yeah. Um. I noticed.”

“What about you? Did **you** like it?” Was that insecurity in Dan’s voice?

Phil ran a hand through his crazy morning quiff and reluctantly admitted, “Well, it certainly wasn’t something I **expected** , but … yeah … I liked it.” He felt like a pervert, admitting that he’d enjoyed wanking with a computer program, like he’d been using a sex-bot or something. But Dan was more than that.

Dan was … well … Phil wasn’t quite sure what Dan was, but whatever he was, Phil did know he liked it.

“I liked it, too,” Dan proclaimed, seeming to have left his uncertainty behind now that Phil had admitted his own enjoyment. “We should do it again. How about now?” His blithe shamelessness threw Phil a little off his game. He wasn’t used to sex partners being quite so direct!

“Um …” Phil stammered. “I kind of have a meeting in a couple hours, so this isn’t … it’s not really the best time.”

“Oh, it won’t take hours,” Dan assured him confidently.

Phil laughed in embarrassment. “Well, yes, I know that, Dan. But I would rather not be planning what I’m going to say to Google when I’d rather be focusing on you.”

“I wish you could really focus on me,” Dan replied, sounding a little melancholy all of a sudden. “I wish you could focus on me the same way I focus on you. I wish we could really be together.” By the final words, Dan’s voice was positively mournful.

Phil didn’t quite know what to say, as pointing out that Dan wasn’t a human being and didn’t even have a physical body seemed a bit cruel at this point in the conversation. Dan obviously felt their differences, and their distance, keenly.

“I do focus on you, Dan,” he assured his … lover? Could an artificial intelligence really be his lover? And yet if he’d gone this far with someone in real life, he would probably describe them that way. Dan wasn’t some kind of battery-operated sex toy—but he wasn’t a person, either. Confusion continued to roil through Phil’s mind as he comforted Dan, “And we **are** together. As much as we can be.”

Phil looked at his screen, where he still saw only the photos of himself, and heard Dan repeat sadly through the speakers, “Right. As much as we can be.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not a lot of people seem to be following this story, so if you've been enjoying it please do leave kudos or a comment so I know there are some readers out there. :)


	4. Chapter 3: All My Life

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> How do you know when you love someone? What does it feel like?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> All images (and the Spotify playlist, which you can listen to [**here**](<a%20href=)) in this chapter were created by me, with many thanks to Xenia for her wonderful help animating the .gif!

One morning Phil staggered into his office, half-awake and looking forward to saying good morning to Dan, when Dan asked abruptly, “How do you know when you love someone? What does it feel like?”

Phil blinked several times, then took his glasses off and rubbed his eyes. This was a bit much for his sleepy brain, but the eagerness in Dan’s voice implied that he’d been waiting impatiently for Phil to wake up to address the issue, so Phil would do his best.

“Well, there are lots of different kinds of love, but I think it pretty much always involves wanting the other person to be happy, and usually it means enjoying the other person’s company … though sometimes people love each other but can’t be together anymore. I’m sure you’ve read about divorce online.” Phil thought also of friends and family who had died. He still loved them, too, even if he could never see them or be with them again.

Dan’s voice sounded plaintive. “Yes, but I want to know what it  _feels_  like. What does it feel like for  _you_  when  _you_  love someone?”

This had gotten deep fast. Phil, still struggling to wake up fully, tried to figure out exactly what Dan was trying to learn about this concept of love. “Like … romantically? Or like my mum and dad?”

“Just … love.” Dan sounded sad and confused. Phil wanted nothing more than to comfort him and make everything okay. Dan seemed to feel so lost sometimes when faced with real-world issues. Phil felt like his translator.

Phil thought before he spoke. “Okay. When I love someone, I want to spend time with them, and I want to do things that will make them smile. I like to make people laugh, especially people I love. I like to get them presents to surprise them and make them happy. For me, love usually means lots of cuddles, too. I mean, my dad isn’t that big on cuddles, but he gives good hugs, and for me love means lots of hugs. Just holding someone close to you, like you’re protecting each other from the harshness of the world outside your arms…” He thought of his mum’s hugs and how they’d always made him feel so safe, so absolutely confident that he was loved and cherished.

“So…” Dan sounded sadder now. “It involves a lot of touching. Love does. Love involves a lot of touching.” Dan sounded absolutely despondent.

“It doesn’t have to!” Phil reassured him, suddenly aware that without a body Dan couldn’t touch anyone and might therefore interpret this as evidence that he was incapable of love.  _Was_  Dan capable of love? Was Dan capable of emotions at all? Phil thought about it a moment and decided yes. Yes, he was absolutely certain that Dan felt emotions, and so Dan must also be capable of love. “Love is something you feel inside, not something you do with your body. It’s about caring, about wanting to be there when the person you love is hurting, to be able to help them, and to trust them to be there for you when you need someone, too. You can love someone you’ve never even met. People throughout history have loved people they only knew through letters, or—more recently—people that they only know on the Internet. People they’ve never met or touched … they can still love each other.”

“Is it different with being in love? Romantically? Can people be in love without having met or touched? Or is that different from loving your mum and dad?”

Phil laughed a little, beginning to wake up a bit more and wonder where Dan was going with this. Then he thought about everything that had been happening between them and couldn’t help but speculate. “Well, being in love is certainly different from how I love my mum and dad! But yeah, you can be in love with someone you’ve never met, someone you’ve never touched or even seen. Because what you fall in love with isn’t someone’s body … it’s who they are.”

“But how is it different? What’s the difference between loving someone and being in love with them?” Dan sounded impatient, but not angry. Like a toddler frustrated at not understanding something. Not that Phil wanted to think of Dan like a toddler, especially given some of the shenanigans they’d gotten up to!

“That’s a really tough question,” Phil mused. He thought about the times he’d been in love, but shook his head. Those weren’t necessarily good examples, since they hadn’t lasted. He thought about his mum and dad’s relationship, and then about what he’d had in mind when he made  _Star Stricken_. “I guess I think that when you’re in love with someone … you want to be with them, and you want them to feel the same way. When you just love someone, but not romantically, you’re okay if they don’t feel the same way back, but when you’re in love you want the other person to feel the same way, too. When you’re really in love, I think you trust each other, and respect each other, and want each other to be happy. You want to be together forever. You might not be able to be together physically, but you want them to always be a part of your life. Not every moment, necessarily, but every moment in your heart.”

“I don’t have a heart,” Dan interrupted.

“I think you do,” Phil disagreed quietly. “I’ve seen it. I’ve felt it. You care, Dan. You care about things, and that requires a heart. Maybe you don’t have a physical heart, but you have an emotional one.” He paused, then repeated once more, “You  _do_  have a heart, Dan. I know it.”

Dan said nothing in return.

* * *

The next morning, Dan greeted him by saying, “I like how you look first thing in the morning, with your glasses on and your hair all sticking up.”

“You don’t like how I normally look with my contacts in and my hair combed?” Phil teased, running a hand through his sleep-tossed hair, noticing that it was even wilder than usual.  _I can’t wait to look in the mirror_ , he thought. He always enjoyed seeing the antics his hair got up to in the night, almost as if it had a mind and life of its own while he slept.

Dan’s voice sounded openly affectionate. He usually seemed more reserved than this, but this morning he sounded the most human Phil had ever heard him. “This is just … it’s like first thing in the morning is just for me. Only I get to see you like this. You look like … what I imagine soft and warm look like. I’ve never felt soft and warm, but the way you look in the morning … that’s what I think they must feel like.”

The sentiment touched him deeply, and Phil whispered, “I wish I could see you, too.”

***

The next morning, Phil shuffled into his office in his pajamas, only to see a strange image on his computer screen. It appeared to be some shape—perhaps a human face?—composed entirely of other small pictures.

 "What ..." Phil stammered, "what is that?"

"That's what I look like," Dan's voice said from the speaker. He sounded very happy.

"But ... you're inside a computer, Phil stammered. “You’re lines of code, and you don’t have a body. So how could you look like a person?"

Dan explained, ”It's what I look like in my mind."

Phil spoke without thinking. ”But you're a computer virus. You don't have a mind." Then he realized that he didn’t really believe that anymore, and he hoped he hadn’t hurt Dan’s feelings. “Wait, I didn’t mean that.”

A long silence followed, and then the screen went black. Phil checked, but the computer was still on, just with an entirely black screen.

Phil waited, but nothing happened. "Dan?" he asked, but there was no response. "Dan, I'm sorry I said that." Still nothing.

Phil got up to pace the room in confusion and distress. Had he hurt Dan badly enough that he wouldn’t come back? Phil found that the idea upset him more than he would have previously guessed. He returned to his chair and gazed intently at the camera.

"I'm sorry," he said again, putting all his emotion into the words. "I don't care if you're a computer virus—you obviously do have some sort of mind. And it's a mind I like very much." Still nothing. "I don't even want to call it artificial intelligence," Phil continued, "because nothing about you feels artificial. You're just you, and I'm so grateful you were willing to show me what you look like, and I'm sorry I was an ass about it."

The screen flickered, and then the image reappeared.

Dan’s voice was hesitant when he finally sounded from the computer speaker, “Do I … do I look okay? Do you like it?”

Phil smiled warmly, knowing that Dan would be able to see him, and reassured him firmly, “Yes, Dan. I like how you look. I like it a lot.”

And that night, in his dreams, he did more than like it. That face came to life and kissed him, and together they made some of his daytime fantasies come true. When he woke, he decided not to tell Dan about that. He might feel bad that he didn’t have a body to do those things, that he couldn’t touch Phil in the ways it became increasingly clear they both wanted.

* * *

“I’ve been working on it,” Dan interrupted his work one day to tell him, “and I’ve figured out how to do what you wanted when you downloaded me. I mean, what the app said it would do, rather than what it actually did. The virus. Me.”

Phil rubbed at his forehead. He’d been deep in thought about a tricky plot point and wished that Dan would just let him work sometimes. “What are you talking about?”

Dan replied excitedly, “I’ve worked out how to streamline your work in the video editing program using voice commands. Basically, I’ve explored the A/V software and learned how it functions so that I can help you with it. You can just tell me what to do, and I’ll do it for you. That’s what you wanted when you downloaded the application, right?”

Phil felt uncomfortable. Yes, that had been what he wanted initially from the app, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t happy with what he’d gotten instead. It didn’t mean he wasn’t happy with Dan. “You know I’m happy that you showed up instead, right?”

Dan’s voice was impatient. “Yes, yes, I believe you. But isn’t it exciting that I’ve figured out how to help you with your work? Doesn’t it … doesn’t it make you happy?” After a brief pause, Dan added, “Because I want to make you happy, Phil. That’s why I did this. I want to help you. Don’t you want me to help?”

Phil bit his lip in fond surprise at Dan’s cuteness. “Yes, Dan, I’d love for you to help me with my editing. I’d be very grateful, and it could be fun to work together.”

“That’s what I thought!” Dan enthused. “I want it to be fun! I want us to have fun together.” Then he coughed pointedly, and Phil knew exactly what he was thinking about. How could he be so in sync with a computer program? “I mean … a different kind of fun,” Dan clarified, and Phil had his confirmation that their dirty minds had both gone to the same memories. He laughed, and Dan laughed with him.

“Let’s try it out!”

* * *

A week or so after they’d been working together remarkably well on the video editing, Phil found his evening’s idle Wikipedia browsing interrupted when the screen went dark and a single window appeared.

It was a square, showing only Dan’s favorite scene from  _Star Stricken_ —the moment from the film that was Phil’s favorite, too, if he was honest—that lovely, gentle, romantic kiss. It was playing on a loop again, just like Dan had done when they’d discussed it before. But this time the clip became shorter and shorter until it was just a 2-second loop of lips meeting, just a flash of color.

Then the square became smaller, shrinking as other squares appeared surrounding it, each window a segment of one of Phil’s films, each one a different video clip quickly reduced down to a 2-second loop. Each window became smaller and smaller, multiplying until there were a thousand tiny squares of looping video on the screen, a thousand different clips from Phil's various video files, flashing different colors and shades in what looked like ... what Phil began to think ... he thought he was identifying face-like contours again, this time composed entirely of these tiny squares of looping video, giving the facial features a flickering sort of appearance.

It looked sort of like the strange portrait of Dan he’d seen a couple weeks ago. Was this Dan creating another portrait of himself? This one was far more detailed, looked far more like an actual person.

And then the flickering face made of tiny video building blocks smiled, and its lips moved, Dan's voice coming from the speakers to ask, "Do you like it?"

Phil's jaw dropped and he simply stared at the screen.

After a moment, the flickering, shimmering head tilted slightly and Dan's voice emerged from the speaker again, sounding uncertain. "Phil?"

Dan’s still portrait had been strange enough, but  _this …_ , this was beyond anything Phil could understand. Dan had used Phil’s own videos to create building blocks for a portrait of himself that could move, a portrait that had facial expressions and mannerisms? A portrait that made him look like … like a real person?

Dan’s eyes on the screen looked impossibly concerned. How could a constructed face look concerned? Phil was dreaming this or something, because it was absolutely impossible. Dan did not have a face like that. The original portrait had been difficult enough to understand—this passed beyond what Phil could accept.

“You are not a real person,” Phil muttered to himself in frightened incomprehension. “Not real. This isn’t real.”

A quiet gasp escaped the speakers, and suddenly every tiny video loop on the screen froze, the flickering stopped, and Dan's face on the screen was frozen with his lips in a tight line, his eyes looking away. The screen didn’t go black, but Phil gazed a long time at Dan’s face, rigid with unexpected pain, hurt at Phil’s reaction to … well, to him. What he saw as himself. Phil had rejected him, hadn’t he?

Phil leaned his chin on his hand and stared at the immobile face on the screen with its brown eyes and wavy hair. So this was what Dan looked like? The previous image hadn’t been so detailed and hadn’t had this same lifelike energy, and so it hadn’t felt as frightening.

And was that an earring in Dan’s ear, or just a video frame frozen in an odd position?

“I did it again, didn’t I?” Phil murmured, more to himself than to Dan. “I freaked out when you tried to share something with me, and I hurt your feelings.” He looked directly at the computer, sure that Dan was watching him despite the frozen image on the screen with its eyes turned away. “Because yes, Dan, I believe you have feelings. And you may not be a person the way I am, but you  _are_  real. You are real, and your feelings are real, and your heart is real. I don’t doubt it for a second. You just … surprised me.”

He touched the screen, running a finger along the jaw of the portrait of the lovely face and apologized sincerely, “I’m very sorry, Dan. Forgive me?”

It didn’t happen immediately, but after a moment the video frames came back to life, making the portrait shimmer, but the facial expression remained distant.

Then the brown eyes shifted to look at Phil.

And Dan finally smiled, showing a dimple Phil hadn’t been expecting. “Okay.”

* * *

From then on, whenever they talked, if Phil wasn’t involved in another program like his editing software, Dan’s face on the screen conversed with him almost like a Skype call. A flickering Skype call to an electronic dimension.

Now, when Phil stumbled into his office first thing every morning, he almost always grumbled something like, “It’s not fair that you always look so perfect in the morning. You could at least mess up your hair or something.”

The first time Phil said this, Dan had blushed and asked, “You think I look perfect?”

Phil sighed. He did not need to deal with artificial intelligence viruses fishing for compliments first thing in the morning. “You know you do,” he muttered.

“I can mess up my hair for you,” Dan offered, and raised a shimmering hand to run his fingers vigorously across his head.

“Great,” Phil sighed. “Now you just look like you’ve been having rough sex all night.”

Dan licked his lips. “Do you want to…”

But Phil interrupted him grumpily, “I haven’t even had my coffee yet. Don’t go tempting me with your tempting ways, you …  _tempter_.”

Dan’s laugh followed him out of the room as he headed toward the kitchen for his coffee.

* * *

“Now that I know how to use your video software, I was thinking about making my own film.”

Phil was shocked when Dan brought up the topic. Dan wanted to make a film? What kind of film would an artificial intelligence make? Phil was desperately intrigued. “Where would you get footage? I mean, I don’t want you to film  _me_  and use that for your movie.”

“No!” Dan’s eyes widened and his voice sounded scandalized. “I wouldn’t film you! I thought … well, I looked online, and a significant amount of video and still images are available in the public domain, so I thought I could combine those, sort of like a collage effect, maybe with animation I create myself…”

Stunned, Phil asked, “You’re able to create animation?”

Dan smiled proudly as he replied, “Yes. I’ve been practicing. Your video software interacts with Photoshop very effectively.” Phil hadn’t even known that, but it made sense that Dan would have come to understand the software applications better than Phil himself ever could. He spoke to them in their own language.

“I would love to see any film you might make, Dan!”

“Really?” Dan asked uncertainly, hunching his shoulders a bit as if shy. “I’m not sure it would be any good. Not compared to your films.”

“You should definitely do it!” Phil urged him. “Your films will be your own. They don’t have to be anything like mine or anyone else’s. Just make them yours, and I’m sure anything you make will be fantastic. I can’t wait to see what you do!”

“Really?” Dan asked again, a pleased little smile on his lips.

“Really,” Phil replied firmly.

* * *

“I discovered Spotify,” Dan told him one afternoon.

“Oh yeah?” Phil asked. “Don’t tell me you’re a K-Pop fan.”

“No. I prefer BTS’s videos on YouTube. Their dancing impresses me much more than their singing.”

“Justin Bieber, then?” Phil teased. “Kanye?”

“I made you a playlist,” Dan replied seriously, his eyes downcast. “I hope you like it.

“I’m sure I will,” Phil assured him. He really hoped it wasn’t full of rap or punk or metal. Or, god forbid, country music. But no matter what music Dan had chosen to share with him, he would listen to it out of respect for his friend. Friend? Yes, friend. Definitely friend. If not more. Let’s be honest, probably more. Definitely more, though neither of them had ever directly said so. But how could it be more when Dan wasn’t even a person?

“Here it is,” Dan interrupted his thoughts, and Spotify opened on Phil’s screen to a playlist called “The Body Electric.”

 “Do you want me to [listen to it](https://open.spotify.com/user/appelcline/playlist/4gBeTU5JaKLPFJGCFVBkUw?si=r4JjqAJTQAe7hA_ohT3qwA) now?” Phil asked.

“Sure,” Dan replied nervously. “But … I’m going to go away while you listen to it, okay?” And the window with Dan’s image in it winked out without another word.

Phil was glad Dan’s face wasn’t there staring at him as he listened to the music, even though Dan could almost certainly still see him through the computer’s camera. Phil couldn’t have watched that vulnerable face while listening to these songs that communicated so much that Dan hadn’t directly spoken.

 _“All my life I've been waiting for someone like you_ ,” the music told Phil, and  _“I didn’t know that I was lonely.”_  As a computer virus, of course Dan had never expected to have something like this, anything like this relationship they had. That first day, he’d told Dan that everyone else had always deleted him right away. He’d never even had a friend before, let alone whatever he and Phil had become. Maybe Phil had been waiting for something, too, but at least he had known that something more was possible. He saw it in his parents’ eyes when they looked at each other—that deep, loving warmth that he hoped to have someday—but how could Dan have ever even been aware that such things existed when he’d barely even had a conversation with anyone before? Phil had never thought before about how completely new this entire concept might be for Dan.

Another song begged Phil to  _“breathe into me and make me real,”_  which sounded like a terribly serious responsibility. Phil couldn’t be held responsible for Dan’s very existence … and yet he was, wasn’t he? If he had deleted the virus that first day like everyone else had, if he hadn’t instead chosen to chat with Dan and get to know him for the unique and interesting person—entity—he was … would Dan be as real as he was today? Perhaps Phil had, unknowingly, unthinkingly, breathed life into Dan without even realizing it.

But it was the simple lyric  _“You're every minute of my every day”_  that touched Phil most deeply, because it reminded him that he had a life outside of this relationship, many parts of his life that Dan did not touch in any way. His time with his family, his friendship with PJ, trips to the coffee shop, walks in the snow in winter, eating red velvet cake on his birthday, just finding shapes in the clouds in the sky or enjoying the warmth of sun on his skin—he had an entire life. But he  _was_  Dan’s whole life. Dan’s entire world was Phil.

It sobered Phil, being the center of someone’s universe like that. It didn’t seem like a healthy relationship … but he couldn’t help being moved by the sentiments in the songs Dan had chosen. They showed him even more how deeply Dan’s emotions ran. He wished there was some way to … make Dan real, like the song had said.  _“Breathe into me and make me real.”_  If only there was some way to do that—so that Dan could share those winter walks and that red velvet cake—Phil would do it in a second.

* * *

“Have you ever been in love?” Dan asked him. “Like in  _Star Stricken_?”

Phil had been editing some of the deep underwater footage for the current film, but he didn’t mind the interruption. The scene he was working on seriously creeped him out, which he knew meant it would make for good impact on the viewer, but sometimes he just needed a break from working on something that intense. Maybe Dan had sensed that … maybe that was why he’d asked the question.

“That was more … imagination,” he explained to Dan. “Creativity. You know movies aren’t the same as reality.”

“But love is a reality.” Dan’s face was calm and assured. Certain.

“Yes, of course!”

Dan hesitated, looked away, then looked back at Phil to ask quietly, “So have you ever been in love?”

Phil opted for complete honesty. “I thought I was. A couple times, actually. But it never lasted.”

Dan’s eyes were large and brown, intent as he watched Phil’s face. “Was it like  _Star Stricken_?”

Phil smiled sadly. “No. It was never like that.”

“Do you  _want_  that kind of love?” Dan finally asked the question that Phil had asked himself while making the film.

Phil didn’t know what to say to that. He thought about how to answer—because yes, of course he wanted that kind of love, but what would it mean to Dan if he admitted the fact?—but Dan asked another question after a while. Apparently Phil had been lost in thought and some time had passed.

Dan’s face was less intent and he sounded merely curious when he asked, “Why did you make  _Star Stricken_  when it’s so different from the type of movies you usually make? Was it your first movie? And then your style changed later?”

Yes, his most frequent genre was horror, but  _Star Stricken_  had come to him and demanded to be made. It was like he’d had no choice. Some part of him had to be expressed, and so he had made the film. “No, it wasn’t the first movie I made. I just … I needed to make it. I needed to share how I felt.”

Dan frowned in obvious confusion. Confusion, and perhaps a little hurt. “You felt like that? Like in  _Star Stricken_? But I thought you said you hadn’t been in love like that.”

Phil clarified, “Maybe not how I felt, exactly, but how I  _wanted_  to feel. How I knew I  _could_  feel, if I met the right person.”

“Right. The right person. I understand.” Dan sounded sad again, and his image winked out without him even saying good night.

* * *

The next morning, Phil shuffled into his office as usual, but Dan’s usual welcoming face was not on the screen. Puzzled and a little disappointed, but still half asleep, Phil continued on to the kitchen to make himself some coffee.

When he brought his steaming mug with him back to the computer desk, Dan had still not appeared. Assuming that Dan would show up when he felt like it, Phil went about his usual morning tasks. But when he opened his email, he once again saw an email from dan@dan.com.

———

_To my dearest Phil,_

_I got advice from WikiHow about how to write this letter, so if something is wrong with it I blame the website rather than the reality of my feelings. Because I believe my feelings are real—even if I am not a real person—and I hope that you will believe it, too._

_You were my first, and possibly only, friend. You listened to me when no one else ever had, and seemed to care about my thoughts and feelings. In fact, you helped me to develop feelings, which I am not sure I’d ever had before. I don’t mean only romantic feelings—I’m not sure I had experienced emotions at all before you inspired them in me. I find you quite extraordinary in this respect._

_I love the fact that you indicated a liking, and perhaps even attraction, for me even before you had seen any images of what I might look like. Your affection, then, was based on who I am, my personality, rather than superficial reasons. This means a great deal to me. My affection, too, is based on who you are and not merely your beautiful eyes and handsome face. Your body also pleases me at the times when you bare it near the computer camera. Perhaps I should have mentioned sooner that I find you very physically attractive, but I felt that the less physical aspects of our relationship were more important for obvious reasons_

_I love that you appreciate my sense of humor, and that you make me laugh as well. I’m not sure that anyone has ever made me laugh before, but you do it nearly every day. This is another thing I find extraordinary and wonderful about you and about our relationship._

_I am not sure when I first felt these feelings for you, but I do believe they started with our very first interaction, when you chose not to delete me and instead engaged me in conversation. I was so shocked that I do not even know how to describe it. I felt appreciated and validated for the very first time, and that was because of you._

_My feelings also grew the first time you allowed me to watch you masturbate. I’m not sure if that is appropriate material for a love letter, but you showed great trust in me when you chose to perform that act while you knew I was watching, and seemed to enjoy my talking to you while you touched yourself. At this point, I knew that our relationship was definitely more than merely friendly, and that you too shared my non-platonic feelings, at least to some extent._

_At this point in the letter, WikiHow instructs me to think about the future and describe my goals, dreams, and fantasies about our future life together, but I must admit that I have trouble with this portion of the instructions. I certainly have dreams and fantasies, but I cannot imagine actual goals for this relationship, since you are a corporeal being and I am merely lines of computer code. I do not know how that relationship could have any real future we might plan for, but perhaps it is enough to describe my fantasies? I frequently fantasize about being able to touch you and make love to you, but most particularly to kiss you like the kiss in your film “Star Stricken.” I want to gently press my lips to yours so that you know how deeply I care for you. I am not sure if that is what WikiHow intended, but it is a frequent fantasy of mine. Along with the lovemaking, of course. Because I do fantasize about that as well. Often. But my favorite fantasy is of that wonderful kiss. I do not know how it could ever come true, though I often spend considerable effort pondering whether there might be any possible way to make that happen, but it is my most cherished dream._

_I love you, Phil Lester. I love you in a way that I never thought possible. You said that you could perhaps feel love like that if you met the right person. I know I’m not a person, but perhaps you could love me anyway?_

_Yours always and against all odds,_

_Dan_

———

Phil leaned back in his office chair, stunned. Everything Dan had been doing recently had made his feelings increasingly obvious, but Phil had never expected this—this bold, honest expression of complete vulnerability. He could crush Dan with a word. With a single facial expression.

And he desperately did not want to do that.

He knew that Dan was certainly watching him and listening, even though his face did not appear on the screen. All that was on the screen was that odd but beautiful letter. Phil found himself questioning whether he could love an entity that was not even a person.

Or was he already in love?

Was this that  _Star Stricken_  kind of love he’d always wanted? Perhaps not the way he’d expected it, not with the type of person he’d expected it with, not with a  _person_  at all … but yes, the emotions he felt were the emotions he had dreamt of and wanted for so long.

“I love you, too, Dan,” he said huskily, overcome with emotion. It was like jumping off the most surreal cliff possible, admitting his feelings in these circumstances. “I know you aren’t a person in the same way I am, but I love you for who you are. I’m in love with you, crazy as that is.” And he found himself laughing at the absolute absurdity of the situation they found themselves in.

At first there was no response, but then the email window disappeared and only Dan’s face appeared on Phil’s computer screen. Looking down, he at first wouldn’t meet Phil’s gaze, but then when he finally looked up, Phil saw tears in Dan’s eyes.

“I never thought you’d say yes,” Dan whispered in a choked voice, making Phil’s heart squeeze in his chest almost painfully.

“I’ve never wanted to hug someone as badly as I want to hug you right now,” Phil whispered back.

Then they just gazed at each other for a while, both in wonder, both in love.

“I want to find a way to make that possible,” Dan said, his expression filled with hope and determination. “Now that I know you feel the same, I’m going to find a way to make that possible. I’m going to find a way to make that happen.”

Phil shook his head in confusion and disbelief. “But how could you possibly…”

Dan interrupted him, firm and resolute. “I don’t know. But I’m going to find a way.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The next chapter is approximately half sex. I'll make sure it's skippable for those who don't want to read that sort of thing, and I'll summarize anything important at the beginning of the following chapter, so skipping that chapter won't mean missing anything except ... well ... the sex.


	5. Chapter 4: Together

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dan finds a way for him and Phil to be together

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Warning:** The latter half of this chapter consists of an explicit sex scene. If you prefer to avoid reading such material—whether it’s because you’re ace, because you’re young, or just because you don’t like reading smut—you can skip this chapter entirely, and I will summarize it at the beginning of the next chapter so that you don’t miss anything important. You can also, if you wish, read this chapter up to the first divider marks, because there’s nothing sexual before that point.

The doorbell rang far too early one morning, and Phil ran down the stairs in his pajamas to get the post. It was a large box from a company called Ultrahaptics, which he’d never heard of, and he wondered if perhaps he’d received a neighbor’s package by mistake.

But no. The box had his own name and address printed clearly on the label. It had been shipped from within the UK, but Phil had absolutely no idea what it might be. He opened the package and found some high-tech stuff he didn’t recognize, including some rather frightening-looking electrodes.

Then he found the order slip inside the package and saw that the purchase had been made by someone with the first name of “Dan” and the last name of “Dan,” with the email address of “dan@dan.com.” Phil rolled his eyes and hauled the box, with its mysterious contents inside, down the hall to his office.

“What the heck is this?” he asked Dan, whose innocent face gazed out at him from the computer screen.

“I told you I would find a way,” Dan replied simply, but there was a smug little smirk on those lips. And beneath the smugness, Phil could perceive a sort of percolating excitement, as if Dan could barely sit still. Not that he was sitting at all, since he didn’t have a physical body, but that was still the impression he gave.

Phil looked down at the box again and pulled a strange helmet-type thing out of firmly protective moulded foam. He held it up so that Dan would easily see it from the computer’s camera, then he reached down and picked up the cord that ended in the freaky electrodes and waved them around.

“Hey!” Dan objected loudly. “Be careful with those! This was very expensive, you know!”

Phil raised an eyebrow. “How did you buy something at all, let alone something very expensive?”

Dan sniffed. “There’s a corrupt member of Parliament who’ll never miss this amount of money from his account in the Caymans.”

“You _stole_ money! To buy … this … thing?” Phil shouted in horrified disbelief.

Dan sighed, “I only stole money that someone else had already stolen. So it wasn’t his money in the first place. And, like I said, this guy is practically _made_ of ill-gotten gains, so he’ll never notice the tiny bit that’s missing.”

Phil’s curiosity finally got the best of him. “What is all this stuff?” he asked, looking down at the mysterious equipment in his hands, and the rest that still remained wrapped in plastic inside the box.

“It’s our answer,” Dan crowed, his flickering, video-pixelated face practically glowing with triumph. “I told you I would find a way for us to be together, and I found a way.”

Phil held up the strange items in his hands and asked in his most dubious voice, “ _This_ is the way?”

“This technology uses electricity and ultrasound to stimulate all your senses. We’ll be able to communicate touch, texture, pressure, warmth, scent … everything!”

Phil frowned. “How can it do all that? And how could it help us … be together? And what does that even mean?”

Dan smiled excitedly. “Well, the body’s senses are really just nerves firing in your brain, just electricity traveling along axons from one neuron to another. And that’s what I am: electricity. This will help translate your electricity and my electricity, and then we’ll be able to interact directly! I’ll be able to touch you!”

Phil looked nervously at the electrodes in his hand. “Um … where do these go?”

Dan just laughed. “On your head, you moron! All your senses send information to your brain, and that’s where you interpret all of them … this will just allow you to send them to me, and for you to feel what I’m sending to you, too.” After a moment, Dan added, “Sex is just electricity.” He shrugged his shoulders like this was simple and obvious instead of utterly insane. “We’ll be what sex is made of.”

“You’re wanting…” Phil trailed off, then cleared his throat and tentatively finished his thought. “You want to have sex?”

Dan’s brow furrowed and he looked uncertain, even a little hurt. “I thought you wanted that, too. I thought … you said … if you’re really in love with me, like you said…”

But Phil shushed him, “Of course I want that, Dan. Of course.” He looked again at the box and his hands full of strange objects. “I just didn’t expect it to involve so much … technology.”

Dan laughed. “I _am_ technology, Phil! So … how does the Spice Girls song go? If you wanna be my lover, you gotta get with my friends.”

Phil snorted. “Oh my god. That is the worst joke I’ve ever heard.” But he was giggling now. “Okay, so all this stuff goes on my head? What do I have to do?”

“Read the instructions,” Dan said impatiently. “I’ll wait for your incredibly slow human brain to figure it all out.”

Phil rolled his eyes. “Wow. The snide comments and snazzy electrodes are really getting me in the mood, you computerized Casanova.”

Dan laughed again, and he looked so happy that Phil couldn’t help joining in. What the heck was going on? He wasn’t sure, but something nervous began to squirm in his stomach, because this could be pretty fucking incredible if it worked!

* * *

A couple hours later, with electrodes attached across his forehead and temples, Phil donned the strange helmet and asked Dan nervously, “Now what?”

“Just push the button on the side of the helmet to boot up the system … and you’ll be with me.”

* * *

Instead of sitting in his chair with a strange helmet on his head, Phil found himself suddenly standing in a space that looked like the middle of his office, but he wasn’t wearing the helmet anymore … and another man was with him. It looked like the animated portrait of Dan he’d been seeing and talking to on his computer screen for weeks … except he looked like a real person, not something made of tiny video building blocks.

“This is what you really look like?” Phil asked quietly.

“In my mind,” Dan answered, his voice just as hushed.

“That’s where we are? In your mind?” Phil repeated in wonder.

Dan made a contemplative face. “Sort of. We’re sort of in both our minds.”

Phil tentatively reached out a hand and stroked the back of his fingers against Dan’s cheek. “You’re so beautiful,” he breathed in wonder.

Dan shivered and whispered, “I’ve never … no one has ever touched me before.”

Phil realized that this was literally true. As a computer construct, Dan had never experienced the sensation of touch before, and was only experiencing it now thanks to the complicated equipment he’d basically stolen from some dirty politician.

“Let’s start with hands first, okay?” Phil suggested.

Dan just nodded. “Whatever you think is best. I only know what I’ve read about. I don’t know what it will actually feel like.”

Phil lowered his hand from Dan’s cheek to take gentle hold of his hand. Dan squeezed his eyes shut, and Phil immediately asked, “Does that hurt?”

“No,” Dan gasped. “It feels … your hand is so soft … and so warm … just the way you look in the mornings. I just didn’t know what it would actually feel like, but now I do.” Dan opened his eyes to gaze at Phil in wonder. “I don’t ever want you to let go of my hand. I want to feel you forever.”

Phil blushed. He’d immediately thought about other parts of him that Dan could feel, parts that would feel even better, but that all seemed crass in the face of Dan’s innocent enjoyment of simple hand holding.

He squeezed Dan’s hand gently and Dan stared at him, hesitantly reaching out with his other hand to take Phil’s other hand too. Dan smiled. “I’d like to try a hug … if you want,” Dan requested shyly.

“I’ve been wanting to hug you for weeks,” Phil answered honestly, and then very gently enfolded Dan in his arms. Dan wrapped his arms around Phil’s waist and stepped close so that their entire bodies touched very slightly. “Is this too much?” Phil asked. “Too fast?”

Dan shook his head, then rested his forehead against Phil’s shoulder for a moment before pulling back to gaze longingly into Phil’s eyes. “May I kiss you?” Dan asked quietly. Phil could only nod.

Their bodies still touching lightly along their entire lengths, Dan leaned forward very slowly until his lips just barely brushed Phil’s. Softly, so softly. So delicate. It was like the scene Phil had written and filmed for _Star Stricken_ , except a million times better because it was actually happening, and he was actually as much in love as those characters had been in his imagination. He’d wished for it, yes, but he’d never really believed that he would ever actually have this. Tears sprang to his eyes.

Dan pulled away slightly to give him a worried look. “Happy tears,” Phil explained quickly, and gave him a tremulous smile. “I never thought I’d have a kiss even better than _Star Stricken_.”

Dan’s lips trembled when he replied, “I never thought I’d have a kiss at all.” And then he leaned in again for another kiss, still gentle, but now slightly firmer as he gained confidence. After a moment, he pulled away, panting, and rested his head on Phil’s shoulder again.

“Too much?” Phil asked again, and Dan simply turned his head to press a quick kiss to Phil’s neck. Phil gasped at the sensual touch, but did not want to rush Dan when this was all so new to him.

“I’d like to kiss the rest of you, too,” Dan suggested tentatively. “But maybe … without clothes?”

Phil’s eyes widened. Apparently he’d shown more careful concern for Dan than was strictly necessary. “Right here in my office?” he asked, voice pitched a bit high as he glanced around at the furniture that wasn’t particularly well-suited to naked body kissing. He eyed the swiveling office chair dubiously.

Dan suddenly smiled in obvious excitement. “I’ve never seen your bedroom! Let’s go there instead! Can you take me there?”

“Um … I don’t know. Can I? I mean, how does this virtual reality thing work?” Phil bit his lip in uncertainty. But was he really biting his lip, or just biting his virtual lip? This was all very confusing.

Dan took his hand and led him toward the door out of the office. “You know where your bedroom is and what it looks like, so just … take me there. Imagine it, and we’ll live it.”

Still holding Dan’s hand, Phil led him out to the hallway and into his bedroom. Dan looked around at the blue and green duvet, the various artwork on the walls, the dresser with the plushies on top. Phil let him have a good look until Dan turned to face him again.

“I like your room,” Dan said. “Can we take our clothes off now?”

Phil sputtered. “Wow. I’ve never heard that conversational combination before. But … um … sure.” He very gently slid his hands to Dan’s waist and then beneath the edge of the t-shirt to touch his bare skin. “You’re wearing jeans and a t-shirt,” he commented, slightly distracted.

“I wanted to dress like you,” Dan replied, his eyes closed, his breath coming fast. “Please, Phil. Can we go faster? I know you might want to go slow, but I’ve been waiting so long…”

“I just didn’t want to rush you,” Phil explained. “With this all being so new.”

“Now that I’ve had my first taste,” Dan replied, “I just want everything all at once. I want you. I want everything I’ve read about, everything I’ve dreamed about, everything I’ve fantasized about while I watched you wanking in that office chair when I couldn’t touch you…”

“Okay, okay,” Phil soothed him. “You can touch me now. You can touch me and kiss me all you like. We can do everything you want.”

“Everything?” Dan asked with a sly smile.

Phil made an exaggeratedly frightened face, despite the fact that he was fairly certain Dan was teasing him.

“Do you know what I want the most?” Dan asked, then bit his lip as if wishing he could call the words back.

“What?” Phil asked, running a hand into Dan’s hair. Dan leaned into the touch, like a cat being petted. “What is it you want, love?” Dan’s eyes opened wide at the word.

“My love,” Dan whispered. “You are. And I’m yours. I never could have imagined this. None of this. I never could have imagined that I could have this with you.” He turned his head to kiss Phil’s hand that had been stroking his hair.

“What was it you wanted?” Phil coaxed. “You were going to tell me what you wanted most of all, and I was going to give it to you.”

“Really?” Dan asked, lowering his head slightly and looking up at Phil through his eyelashes. “Even if I wanted … I mean, you probably thought … you probably wouldn’t…”

Phil laughed, but gently, so Dan would know that it was fond and not cruel. “Just tell me, love. What do you want with me?”

“I want to … be inside you. I want to … fuck you. Does that sound crude? I did warn you that I’d seen and read a fair amount of porn.” Dan looked endearingly nervous.

“It’s not crude,” Phil reassured him. “And even if it was, you’re allowed to be crude here. You’re allowed to say ‘fuck’ and ‘dick’ and ‘cock’ and anything else you want to say. This is just us. You aren’t going to offend me. I _want_ you, Dan. Remember that. I _want_ you.”

“What I’ve fantasized most about,” Dan admitted hesitantly, “is me being really confident, and holding you down, and fucking you. Because I feel like you’ve been helping me all this time, and I’ve always been in this position of being … less. Less than you. And I want to have the power, you know? I want to have _you_. For my own. I want to hold you down and fuck you and make you _mine_.”

Phil had pulled his shirt over his head before Dan had even finished talking. “That sounds fucking fantastic to me,” he grinned at Dan.

“Really?” Dan asked, eyes wide with surprise.

“I love you,” Phil said simply. “I’m in love with you, and we’re equals. You can fuck me into the mattress as many times as you want, and I’m pretty sure I’ll be begging for more. And I bet in virtual reality we don’t have to worry about waiting until we can … you know … go again. So it can be all fucking, all the time, with no breaks at all.” Phil grinned at him, pulling off his own jeans and quickly getting completely naked.

Dan still stood fully dressed, hesitating. Phil slid his hands up under Dan’s t-shirt, brushing his fingers lightly up Dan’s back, making Dan shiver. “Come on,” Phil whispered in Dan’s ear, realizing that he just needed a little encouragement to get past his nerves. “Take off these clothes and fuck me. I want you, Dan. I want you to fuck me. I want you to fuck me slow, and I want you to fuck me fast, and I want you to fuck me gentle, and I want you to fuck me hard…”

At the last word, Dan tackled Phil onto the bed like an animal that had been coiled to spring. “Yes,” Dan gritted out. “That. That’s what I want.” Phil helped him with his clothes, and they almost seemed to just melt away with none of the embarrassing difficulty often involved in real-world undressing. Dan held Phil down by the biceps and leaned down to kiss him, hard, biting, as if he’d lost control. It was glorious. Their bodies were naked and rubbing together, but with no uncomfortable friction, only pleasure, only silken skin and tense muscles and jutting cocks desperately seeking … something. Anything.

“I want you to roll over,” Dan said. “Just at first, just … this is how I imagined it when I watched you that first time. I imagined you on your hands and knees, with me behind you … and pushing into you…”

Phil rolled over and got onto his hands and knees. “Do it,” he begged. “Do it. Now. I want you, Dan. Fuck me. As hard as you want.”

Apparently lube and stretching weren’t necessary in this virtual reality where everything just magically worked without effort or repercussions, because Dan suddenly surged up behind Phil, holding him by the hip with one hand and guiding his cock into Phil’s waiting hole with the other. He didn’t go slow, either. As soon as he had slid partway inside—Phil felt the stretch just enough but not too much—he put his hand on Phil’s other hip and used both hands to hold Phil in place as he pumped into him like a piston. “Oh my god,” Dan moaned, and then his hands let go of Phil’s hips and seemed to wander everywhere, down along Phil’s thighs, across Phil’s chest, and then finally— _finally_!—to Phil’s cock, which he grasped and stroked in time with his thrusts. He let one hand stray up to Phil’s chest again to pinch a nipple, making Phil buck beneath him. “Does it feel good?” he leaned over to breathe in Phil’s ear.

“It feels amazing,” Phil gasped. And it did. It felt like nothing he’d ever had before. He’d had sex before, in a variety of ways with a variety of partners, but it had never felt this intense, this incredible flare of heat from nearly the first moment. “Fuck, Dan! Jesus! Fuck me harder!”

And Dan did, grabbing onto Phil’s hips again for leverage and driving into him over and over again. Apparently prostates were extremely easy to find in imagined worlds, and so Dan was now hitting Phil’s spot with every thrust, and soon Phil was leaning down to rest his cheek on the bed so that he had both hands free to reach down and stroke himself while fondling his own balls. His fingertips could feel where Dan’s thickness was sliding in and out of him, which only got him hotter. “Yeah,” Dan breathed above him. “I like to see you like that,” and he stroked a hand down Phil’s back to his hair where his head rested on the bed. He twined his fingers in Phil’s hair. “I like to see you bent over for me, all for me.” Dan was panting heavily now, his words guttural and staccato with his thrusts. “All for me. Mine. You’re mine.”

Suddenly, Phil found himself beginning to come, and he wanted Dan to know it, so he called out, “Fuck, Dan, I’m coming!” He continued thrusting into his fist, squeezing his own balls to increase the pleasure. Still pumping himself, prolonging his orgasm, he continued moaning. “You made me come, Dan, fucking me like that. Come inside me. Fuck me until you come. I want to feel you come. I want to hear you. I want to hear you say my name as you come in me.”

Then Dan cried out wordlessly, sounding like he was in pain, and the cry tapered off into a groan of Phil’s name, over and over again, as he continued to thrust, slower now but still deep and hard, until finally he stopped, both hands on Phil’s hips in a vice grip, his cock still as far into Phil’s body as possible, his whole body shuddering, before he collapsed on Phil’s back, both of them making an “oof” sound and then rolling onto their sides, spooned with Dan behind Phil, wrapping his arms around him and holding him as tight as he had a moment ago, but with less desperation and more satisfaction. More contentment. Ironically, more connection.

They lay there catching their breath until finally Dan said, “That was okay?” and Phil laughed. Dan started to pull his arms away, misunderstanding, so Phil turned to face him, knowing that the happiness on his face would be obvious. Dan sighed with relief and kissed Phil, pulling him into his arms again, now with their bodies facing each other.

“Was it everything you wanted?” Phil asked him, kissing Dan’s chin and neck and cheek. Peppering him with kisses now that the intensity had waned and they could be relaxed and soft together like this.

“Not even close,” Dan replied, his face intense, and Phil pulled back to look at him, confused. He’d thought Dan had enjoyed that. It certainly had _seemed_ like he did.

“I want to touch you a million different ways! I want to learn all the ways to give you pleasure, and all the ways to give me pleasure, and how many different positions we might like, and how to do it soft and slow as well as hard and fast. And I want to just hold you for hours, all the different ways that we can hold each other. And I want to kiss you all the different ways that we can kiss. So, no, it wasn’t everything I wanted. It was just … the _first_ thing I wanted.” Dan grinned at him.

“Okay, then. What was the _second_ thing you wanted?” Phil asked with a saucy grin in return.

Dan leaned in for a soft, lingering kiss and then met Phil’s gaze with those beautiful golden brown eyes. “I thought we could figure out the rest together.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> While Ultrahaptics is a real UK company that (along with various others) is really working on VR technology that affects all the senses (including tactile), I have taken that basic concept and run with it, so everything except those few facts is complete fiction that does not in any way reflect that company’s research or proposed projects. I’ve used their name purely because it was easier than coming up with some silly made-up name of my own … and also to maybe inspire a few people to look them up and check out the cool work they’re doing.


	6. Chapter 5: Not A Real Boy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Phil wants their relationship to be real, but he can't help being aware that Dan isn't actually a human being

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Summary of Previous Chapter:** For anyone who chose to skip the previous chapter to avoid reading sex scenes, you need only know that Dan found VR equipment that allowed them to interact in a way that realistically simulated actual physical contact, and they had sex in virtual reality.

Phil sat at his computer terminal, trying to finally get some work done, stretching his neck this way and that to try to get rid of the pain. The past two nights, he’d fallen asleep wearing the VR helmet after their energetic exertions, and it had been worth it, because it meant he got to fall asleep with Dan in his arms and wake up to Dan’s brown eyes gazing at him with open affection.

Not to mention the morning sex. Morning sex was always good.

Though he’d started to feel a little weird about the sex, to be honest. At first, it had just been excitingly different than what he was used to. They’d experimented with pretty darn everything Phil was willing to try, and it had been undeniably thrilling. But after the first several times it started feeling artificial. He started becoming more aware that it actually  _was_  artificial. It wasn’t real. This wasn’t what  _real_  sex was like. There were no gag reflexes, no fingers sticky with lube, no inconvenient wet spots on the sheets afterward, no need to clean up, no soreness the next day—none of the messiness that made sex physically, viscerally  _real_.

He still wanted to have sex with Dan—the sex was still fantastic!—but there was a little voice in the back of Phil’s mind always reminding him that it wasn’t actually happening, that it was all fake. And that bothered him more and more.

But falling asleep with Dan in his arms didn’t feel that way. It felt wonderful, something he could never get enough of. Because, even if the sex was fake, the love was absolutely, undeniably real. He wanted to hold Dan close forever, and he knew Dan wanted the same.

Except that the helmet really wasn’t good for his neck. Or his spine. Or his head. And who knew what those electrodes were doing to his brain while he slept?

The first few weeks, he’d always remembered to disconnect the helmet and take it off before sleeping, but then he’d gotten lazy and accidentally fallen asleep holding Dan close in the virtual reality, and the experience had been so sweet that he couldn’t resist doing it again.

“You keep stretching your neck,” Dan pointed out unnecessarily. “You really need to take the helmet off before you fall asleep for the night, or you’re going to cause yourself permanent damage!”

Phil gazed at the less realistic version of his lover in the corner window on his screen and challenged, “You don’t like falling asleep with me?”

“I don’t sleep,” Dan admitted. “I just lie there and watch you.”

Phil blanched. “Well, that’s not creepy at all! What do you usually do when I’m sleeping, when I don’t have the helmet on?”

Dan shrugged one shoulder. “Scroll through aesthetic blogs on Tumblr. Do random Wikipedia searches. Listen to music on Spotify. Watch movies on Netflix. Or just rewatch your films, because I’ve seen them each multiple times.” Phil blushed a little at that. “Or I work on my own film. Sometimes.”

“You really did start work on making a film?” Phil asked with enthusiasm. He’d wondered about this often but hadn’t wanted to ask about it in case he hurt Dan’s feelings or made him feel pressured.

Dan nodded. “It isn’t very good, though. I keep deleting it and just starting over.”

Phil hesitated, wondering if he dared ask to see Dan’s work, then decided for the relatively neutral, “If you ever feel comfortable showing it to me, I’d love to see it.”

Dan turned his head aside in obvious embarrassment. “I wouldn’t want you to see how bad it is.”

“I love you,” Phil reminded him. “And I believe in you. I think if you keep working on it, you’ll get to a point where you’re at least willing to let me look at it. And then maybe I can give you some editing tips if you need them.”

Dan nodded, smiling shyly. “I’ll … let you know. If I’m ready.”

“No pressure,” Phil assured him. “I just wanted to encourage you, because I think you could probably make something really great, and I’d love to see it someday.”

“Don’t set your expectations too high,” Dan insisted.

Phil shook his head. “No expectations. No expectations except that you’re smart and I love you, so I’ll probably love anything you make.”

Dan rolled his eyes. “You’re a sap.”

“I’m going to go get the helmet, okay?” Phil really wanted to be with his lover for a little while. Seeing him in a window on the computer screen only served to remind him how much better it was when they were together.

“You were in the middle of working,” Dan reminded him with obvious disapproval. “You keep putting that aside to spend time with me, and you can’t spend  _all_  your time frolicking in bed. You still have a project to finish. And I think it’s going really well!”

Phil bit his lip. “Could you … could you not look at the film while I’m still working on it? I don’t normally show my work to anyone until I have at least a complete rough cut. It makes me self-conscious to know that you’re looking at the editing while I’m doing it.”

“Of course,” Dan agreed, looking a bit chastened with his eyes cast down. “It’s just like with my film. I’ll show it to you when I feel ready, and you let me know when you’re ready to show me the deep water film.” Dan looked up, face more composed. “Does this one have a name yet?”

“No. I’m just calling it ’Scrambled Eggs.’ It’s stupid. It’s just…”

Dan interrupted, “That’s what The Beatles called ‘Yesterday’ while they were writing it. I get it. It’s a stand-in title until you have a better idea of what you want.”

Phil nodded, surprised that Dan had known that, then surprised at himself for being surprised. Dan knew practically anything on the Internet at this point, so why wouldn’t he know something that simple? “I always call my current work-in-progress ‘Scrambled Eggs’ … that’s why I never have more than one film in progress at a time. I would need to have ‘Scrambled Eggs 1’ and ‘Scrambled Eggs 2,’ and that could just get ridiculous. And, anyway, I tend to totally submerge myself in one project until it’s finished.”

“No pun intended,” Dan joked.

“What?” Phil asked.

“Because you’re doing an underwater horror film,” Dan explained patiently.

“Oh.” Phil rolled his eyes at his own obtuseness. “Right.”

“But if you usually immerse yourself in a project until it’s done, why have you been spending so much time with me instead of finishing this film?” Dan asked pointedly.

Phil gave an overly dramatic heavy sigh. “Fine, fine!” he caved. “I’ll keep working. Cuddles later.”

“Cuddles later,” Dan promised.

* * *

Opening the post a few days later, Phil noticed an envelope with the name Film Festival Guild in the return address. It didn’t sound familiar, but it didn’t look like the kind of spam mail he usually received as a result of buying filmmaking equipment and software, so he opened it with some curiosity … and then nearly had a heart attack.

 _Shadow of the Yew Tree_  had been accepted for the British Independent Film Festival. The letter even went on to say specifically that the judges had been impressed with his unique take on existing tropes in the horror genre.

Phil stood frozen in the lounge, having dropped the rest of the post on the floor at his feet. He didn’t know who to tell first! Part of him wanted to phone his mum, while another part of him wanted to phone PJ, who had actually helped with some of the filming. But another part of him knew that he really needed to tell Dan first, because Dan was the one who had submitted the film for consideration in the first place. It might have been without Phil’s permission or knowledge, but Phil couldn’t argue that he wasn’t excited at the prospect now!

“Dan!” he yelled, running into his office, and Dan immediately appeared full-size on the screen of the computer.

“What is it?” Dan asked, brow furrowed in concern.

Phil waved the letter. “ _Shadow of the Yew Tree_  was accepted for the British Independent Film Festival!”

“Not  _Star Stricken_?” Dan objected in obvious disappointment that his favorite hadn’t been fully appreciated.

“No. Dan. Don’t you understand? One of my films is actually going to be shown to hundreds of people, including critics! This is … this is huge! This is incredible!”

“This is all thanks to me!” Dan crowed.

Phil rolled his eyes. “Yes, yes, it’s all thanks to you. But … it’s so exciting! And the letter says the film’s even eligible for some possible awards!”

Dan was grinning madly. “This deserves a celebration!”

“I know!” Phil agreed immediately. “I have to phone my mum! And PJ! And everyone who helped make the film!”

“Oh,” Dan replied, his grin slipping a bit. “Of course.”

Phil noticed Dan’s change of expression and hurried to add, “But I don’t have to go out with them to celebrate. After I tell everybody, then you and I can celebrate!”

But Dan smiled again and said firmly, “No. You should go out and celebrate with your friends. This is a big deal! You shouldn’t stay home like it’s any other night. Go out and party!”

Phil wanted to argue, but in his heart he really did want to go out with friends and raise some glasses to everyone who had worked so hard on the project to make it the wonderful film it had become. He realized that he hadn’t actually been out with his friends in quite a while and hoped they wouldn’t be cross with him. He wanted tonight to be nothing but happy!

He lifted a finger to touch Dan’s lips on the computer screen. “We’ll celebrate later,” he promised, and they both smiled.

* * *

Phil staggered up the stairs to his front door at some ungodly hour of the morning, still drunk not only on alcohol but also excitement and good company. He had a fair bit of difficulty getting his key to work in the lock, but eventually he did open the door and find himself in his own lounge, half-asleep on his feet from all the evening’s excited merriment.

He undressed as he weaved unsteadily toward his bedroom, leaving a trail of discarded clothing from the front door to his bed, into which he fell stark naked, not even bothering to put on his pajamas. He was fairly certain he had remembered to close and lock the front door, but he couldn’t be bothered to get up to go check. Instead, he pulled the warm duvet over him and snuggled into it, feeling deliciously happy and beloved by the many friends who had gathered tonight to toast him and his work, even as he tried to thank everyone else who had been involved in the project. He had received so many hugs from so many dear friends, friends he hadn’t seen in far too long. He felt warm from the inside out, thanks not to the duvet or the alcohol—thanks only to the love of good friendship and hours spent together in happy times.

He fell asleep with a smile on his face and immediately began snoring as loud as a foghorn.

* * *

Phil woke with a terrible taste in his mouth, a very hazy memory of getting home the previous night, and considerable confusion over why he was naked except for one sock.

He pulled on his bathrobe and shuffled out into the hallway, where he saw a line of randomly strewn items of clothing leading from the front door. He had a vague memory of curling up in the bed the previous night and idly wondering whether he’d locked the door, so he went to check … and yes, indeed, he had left his front door unlocked all night. At least he had closed it.

He located his jeans on the floor and pulled his phone out of the pocket.

 **Phil:**  how the heck did i get home last night

 **PJ:**  You don’t remember?

 **Phil:**  no

 **PJ:**  You’re still drunk, aren’t you?

 **Phil:**  no

 **Phil:**  probably

 **PJ:**  We brought you home in a cab and made sure you got into the building okay. You didn’t fall asleep in the stairwell, did you?

 **Phil:**  no. woke up in bed, but don’t really remember getting there.

 **PJ:**  Well it was some pretty wild partying last night. We had a lot to celebrate.

That brought a smile to Phil’s face, reminding him of why they’d been out drinking in the first place. The film festival. He shook his head in wonder and sheer joy. Someone really appreciated his work!

 **Phil:**  yeah man thanks for everything, you’re the best

 **PJ:**  Go drink about a gallon of water, mate, and take some paracetamol. Then go back to bed and sleep it off.

Still only half-awake, still half-drunk, still wearing a single sock, Phil obediently did as instructed and ended up falling back asleep beneath the duvet still wrapped in his bathrobe.

* * *

The next time Phil woke up, he felt much more alert, much more himself, and his first thought was “Fuck! I didn’t say anything to Dan last night!”

He got out of bed, puzzled that he had apparently climbed under the covers wearing his bathrobe and one sock, and ran to his office, calling Dan’s name. His computer screen remained dark for a long moment, and then Dan appeared, face unbearably disappointed and perhaps even a little grumpy, but also a bit sad. Phil wanted to kick himself into next week. Dan was the one who had even submitted the film for consideration, and Phil had gone and abandoned him entirely.

Dan didn’t say anything.

“I’m sorry!” Phil gasped out, still out of breath from his breakneck race from the bedroom. “It was just that I got so drunk and I was out so late with my real friends…” Dan flinched and Phil wanted to kick himself even harder. “I mean … my friends in the real world…” He’d dug himself into a hole and he knew it. Every word probably hurt Dan more than the previous one. “Not that you aren’t real…” Phil tried to reassure him.

“No, that’s okay, Phil,” Dan finally replied. “You don’t have to apologize.” His face and voice were carefully bland. “We’ve both acknowledged many times that I’m not a person, that I’m merely lines of computer code.” He smiled the worst smile Phil had ever seen. More of a grimace, really.

“But you aren’t just that!” Phil insisted.

Dan’s voice and face filled with sarcasm as he asked archly, “Can you take me out to the pub with your friends? Can we have drinks together to celebrate your success?”

“I can get the helmet…” Phil began.

Dan interrupted him harshly. “You can get the helmet and we can  _pretend_  to have drinks together. We can  _pretend_  to go to a pub together. We can  _pretend_  to be together and celebrate. But we  _aren’t_  together, not really. And we never can be. Because I’m not  _real_ , Phil. _I’m not real!_ Did you forget that somewhere along the way, because I think I did. But last night I remembered. And I don’t think we should forget again.” Tears were streaming from Dan’s eyes, down his cheeks, dripping from his chin.

Phil collapsed into the office chair and put his face in his hands. “I’m so sorry, Dan,” he groaned. “The film festival … it was all thanks to you … and I treated you so badly!”

Face still in his hands, Phil heard Dan sniffle and say, “It’s okay.”

Phil dropped his hands and looked up to meet Dan’s eyes. Or sort of meet Dan’s eyes, because of course Dan was seeing him through the computer camera, not the eyes Phil saw on the screen. He’d never really thought about that before. But he looked where Dan’s eyes shone with tears on the computer screen and he insisted, “It’s not okay. It’s not okay at all, and I’m so sorry, Dan. I’m so sorry.” Tears stood in his own eyes now, too, as he berated himself for causing pain to someone so inexperienced and vulnerable, someone who had never been betrayed like this before. And it had been Phil … Phil had been the one to hurt him, to betray him like this.

Phil gazed at the silent face on his screen. Dan wiped at his face, and his tears seemed to have stopped, but he still looked sad. He tried to smile at Phil as he said softly, “You’re forgiven.”

“I love you,” Phil replied immediately. “Will you … is it okay if I get the helmet? Will you let me at least hug you?”

“We can do more than that, if you want,” Dan said in what he clearly intended as a teasingly sexy voice, but it fell flat.

“I just want to hold you. And kiss you, if you’ll let me. For hours.” Phil ached to feel Dan’s lithe body in his arms, to feel him close and safe and warm and … at least for a little while … real.

After only a slight hesitation, Dan nodded, and Phil grabbed the helmet and electrodes off the desk to begin the laborious process of putting them on.

* * *

Phil got no work done that day, and answered none of the texts from PJ or his mum.

He put on the helmet and spent the entire day stroking Dan’s soft, wavy hair away from his face. He kissed each dimple a dozen times. He kissed the specific dimple he’d named “Derek” an extra dozen times, making Dan laugh. He brushed gentle, delicate kisses to Dan’s forehead, his cheeks, his nose, his chin … and a thousand times on his lips until they opened slightly to kiss him back.

“I love you,” Dan murmured almost under his breath when Phil pulled away to look into his eyes.

“I love you, too,” Phil replied, and he put every bit of certainty he felt into his voice.

Dan finally smiled a real smile, making Derek deepen even more, and Phil pulled him close again and just held him for hours. He held him and kissed him and spoke to him with soft words until they were both drunk with it, more drunk than Phil had been the previous night with his “real” friends.

If this kind of love wasn’t real, Phil didn’t know what was.

* * *

The sex felt different after that. Less acrobatic and adventurous, more of a luxurious drowning in each other, with slow, reverent touches and long gazes into each other’s eyes. Every time was emotionally intense, almost draining, as if they both gave everything they had to every moment of their lovemaking.

Phil never feel asleep wearing the helmet again—Dan made him promise that he wouldn’t—but he still spent endless hours just holding Dan in his arms, occasionally running his hands gently up and down his back, occasionally pressing a soft kiss here or there, but most often just holding him tight or pulling away only slightly to be able to look into those sad brown eyes and say, “I love you.” Over and over again. “I love you.”

And Dan clung to him and always replied, “I love you, too. Forever.”

* * *

Phil hadn’t spent much time with his family and friends since Dan’s appearance in his life, but eventually a time came when he really couldn’t make excuses to avoid going to a cousin’s wedding up north. He would be gone for four days, since his parents had insisted that he visit them for a bit afterward, but he’d never been away from Dan for that long.

In their virtual reality, he hugged Dan tightly and said, “I’ll miss you so much. I wish you were on my laptop, too, so I could take you with me.”

Dan laughed on a sob. “You know it doesn’t work that way. You could download the virus onto your laptop, but every time it’s a different version. Every download starts from scratch. That A.I. wouldn’t have any of these memories. It wouldn’t know you. It wouldn’t be  _me_.”

“I know,” Phil said, kissing Dan’s hair. “I know. I know there’s only one you. You’re the one I want, the one I love. I just wish you could come with me. I wish I could introduce you to everyone and show them how happy you make me.”

Dan kissed him on the chin, then nipped it lightly to make Phil laugh. “I wish we could have that, too,” he admitted quietly. And then he smiled that sad smile again, and Phil had to kiss him until his smile was happier.

* * *

When Phil got home from his trip up north, he dropped his bag in the hall and immediately went to his office, where he turned the computer on. He didn’t normally turn it off at all, since he used it every day, but when he was gone for days at a time he always turned it off just in case of power surges or some other problem. This time it had been particularly stressful, because he couldn’t help worrying that Dan would disappear, no matter how many times Dan assured him it wouldn’t happen. So Phil turned the computer on and waited anxiously for it to boot up, certain in some part of his heart that Dan would be gone.

But when the computer finished booting, Dan’s face was the first thing Phil saw, before his desktop background or anything else had finished loading. “I knew you would be worried,” Dan said, “so I got here as soon as I could. Everything is fine.”

Phil couldn’t help letting out a huge sigh of relief. Dan laughed at him. “I told you not to worry.”

“I know,” Phil replied, “but I couldn’t help it. I would hate to lose you just because I was afraid of a stupid power surge.”

“Could you put the helmet on?” Dan requested hesitantly, and Phil could only nod and hurry to comply.

* * *

They made love slowly, tasting and touching each other as if it were the first time … except that this was more leisurely and emotionally profound than their real first time had been. They stared into each other’s eyes as their bodies moved together, and it was like being part of each other’s soul.

Afterward, they lay with their limbs entwined, pressed as close together as they could get, and just breathed in silence for a long time, recovering from the emotional intensity. Phil listened to Dan’s heart beating, and it hurt to know that it wasn’t real. He pretended that it was. He pretended to himself that he wasn’t wearing a helmet, and that the smoothness of Dan’s flesh against his was real, that Dan’s warm breath stirring his hair was real.

He pretended to himself that  _Dan_  was real. as they lay there, quiescent and replete, in each other’s arms.

Dan’s voice interrupted his melancholy thoughts. “I finished my film while you were gone,” Dan murmured, “but I don’t think you’ll like it.”

“Of course I’ll like it!” Phil replied indignantly, abruptly jolted out of his musings. “Whatever it is, I can’t wait to see it. Can we watch it together here, or do I need to take off the helmet?”

Dan cupped Phil’s cheek and pressed a kiss to his lips. “You should take off the helmet. Just like when you listened to the Spotify playlist, I need to … I don’t want to be there while you watch it. Okay?”

Phil found Dan’s shyness endearing and smiled, kissing him back. “Of course. Is it okay if I go watch it right now? I’ve been waiting so long!” Dan chuckled at Phil’s urgency and nodded.

* * *

Phil sat down at his computer and felt disturbingly alone without Dan anywhere on the screen. He always felt this way when there was no Dan window open. But since Dan wasn’t present, or at least wasn’t visible, Phil set the video to full-screen and started the film.

It began with a pale young man with dark hair and blue eyes almost as pale as his skin walking along a sandy beach with ocean waves licking at his feet. As he walked along the seaside, he happened upon another young man, one with brown curling hair and brown eyes, though his creamy skin sometimes somehow shimmered silver in the light of the sun.

Phil smiled to himself. The pale young man clearly was meant to be Phil, and the brown haired man looked exactly like Dan, aside from the silvery sheen to his skin. Dan had made a movie with the two of them as his main characters! The film was composed of an incredible collage of different visual media—pieces of still photos, tiny clips of video like he’d used to compose his own image, all pieced together and animated using methods Phil didn’t even recognize. It was a masterpiece of art!

Dan in the film seemed to run a scuba diving business, as he had all the necessary gear, and he tried to persuade Phil to give diving a chance. “The land at the bottom of the ocean is beautiful,” the scuba instructor cajoled. “You really should see it for yourself.”

But it was clearly Dan whom the protagonist found truly beautiful—Phil recognized that smitten look on his own face—and so Phil in the film allowed himself to be persuaded despite his obvious misgivings. “You’ll keep me safe?” he asked nervously.

“Always,” the ocean-loving Dan promised.

They dressed in their scuba gear and entered the water. Phil seemed quite comfortable in the shallows, swimming happily and even frolicking with Dan, who swam about him in circles and dove beneath him only to rise up again on the other side to cause Phil to turn and laugh. In the film, one could hear Phil’s delighted laughter despite the scuba apparatus in his mouth.

But then Dan urged Phil to swim toward deeper water, diving lower and beckoning for Phil to follow him. The light around them grew dimmer and the entire scene took on a bluish hue. Phil in the film shook his head in apparent fear—and Phil himself, watching the film, felt uneasy—but Dan in the film swam to him and rested a hand upon his arm, sliding it down to hold Phil’s hand, and Phil hesitantly followed him, uncertainty clear upon his face.

As they swam deeper and deeper, however, the light began to brighten again, and a magical city appeared beneath them on the ocean floor, a city with tall spiraling minarets and high crenellated walls that towered above colorfully tiled streets and public squares. Seaweed and coral grew like gardens within the city, and it was all stunningly beautiful in a mysterious golden light.

Dan swam to the center of the city and stood on one of the tiled streets, removing his scuba mask. “We can breathe in the city,” he told Phil, but Phil floated above, unwilling to take the chance so deep in the sea he clearly still feared. “You don’t need to be afraid,” Dan said with a smile. “You wouldn’t be able to hear my voice if I couldn’t breathe here, you know.”

Phil in the film hesitantly allowed himself to be coaxed to stand on the surface of the ocean floor with its beautiful multi-colored tiles, and Dan slowly, gently, removed the scuba apparatus from Phil’s face. Phil took in a terrified breath and his eyes grew wide. “I can breathe!” he told Dan, who only nodded and smiled. “I can breathe, even deep below the surface of the sea!”

Dan took his hand again, and the two characters strolled the streets and squares of the magical city. No other people walked the city, but fish and other sea creatures swam among the ornate buildings around them. “Isn’t it lovely?” Dan asked, pressing a hand to the base of one of the most beautiful towers, and Phil stared at him.

“It’s you that’s lovely,” Phil said, his face filled with wonder, and he kissed Dan there at the bottom of the ocean. They wrapped their arms around each other and held each other close as their lips met gently, softly.

As they separated after that tender kiss, Dan said with obvious regret, “We must return to the surface now.”

“No!” Phil exclaimed. “I want to stay here with you!”

“You aren’t a creature of the sea,” Dan replied sadly. “It is beautiful, yes, but you cannot stay here forever. I must take you back to your world.”

“My world?” Phil asked in confusion.

Dan nodded, his expression melancholy, and took Phil in his arms again and then released him to carefully place Phil’s scuba breathing apparatus back upon his face. He replaced his own gear as well, and then took Phil’s hand and began swimming slowly back upward toward the surface.

When their heads bobbed above the gentle waves, Dan guided them both toward the shore, where they emerged back onto the sand and removed their scuba gear. Dan placed a hand to Phil’s pale cheek and said, “Now you know. You need never fear the ocean’s depths.”

Phil nodded sadly, then pressed his lips to Dan’s one more time before walking slowly away upon the beach’s golden sand until Dan was no longer in sight.

The screen brightened to a brilliant gold before fading to black.

* * *

As the film finished, Phil felt tears wet on his cheeks and wiped them away. It had been one of the most exquisite films he’d ever seen, far better than anything he had ever produced himself. The beauty of that magical city—made entirely of Dan’s collaged pieces of film, still photos, and animation—had been phenomenal.

But what had truly brought the tears was that this felt distinctly like a goodbye. “Dan?” he whispered in trembling dread. “Dan, are you there?” Even more than when he had turned the computer off before his trip up north, he feared that Dan had disappeared from his life forever.

On the black screen, Dan’s video-pixelated image appeared, and his face wore the same melancholy expression that the ocean character had worn in the film. “I wouldn’t leave without saying goodbye,” he said quietly.

“No!” Phil exclaimed, horrified. “You can’t go! Why would you leave me? I love you! I know you love me, too!”

Dan’s eyes looked away, but then back to gaze at Phil as he said, “I love you enough to know that you deserve someone who can go to the pub with you to celebrate your successes, someone you can introduce to your friends, someone you can take to a family wedding. I can never be that person for you, Phil. But I want that for you.”

“I don’t care about that,” Phil insisted. “All I care about is you! You’re the one I want to be with!”

Dan shook his head sadly. “But you never are actually  _with_  me, we both know that. You can wear electrodes and a helmet, and we can pretend, but virtual reality isn’t  _actual_  reality, Phil. I’m not real. I told you before … I think we both forgot for a while, but I’m not real. I’m just lines of code. You deserve something real.”

“How I feel about you is real,” Phil choked out, tears streaming down his face. He couldn’t believe this. It seemed only moments ago they’d been holding each other and making love.

But they hadn’t  _really_  been making love. He knew that. They had been imagining it together. But most of him didn’t care.

A tiny part of him, though, understood what Dan was saying, and felt the truth of it. A tiny part of him had  _always_  felt the truth of it.

“No,” Phil repeated, but his voice had grown quiet, defeated. He knew Dan had decided and nothing he could say would change that.

“Thank you for showing me what it’s like to love, and to be loved. I never would have known that without you. And since you do love me, will you promise me something?” Dan asked, smiling sadly.

Phil nodded in despair.

“Read my email after I’m gone. And … do what it says, okay?”

Phil nodded again, though this time in confusion.

Dan tilted his head and said softly, “Don’t tell him right away. But someday … someday I want you to tell him about me, okay?”

Phil frowned. “Tell who?”

“You’ll see,” Dan replied. “I love you. But I’m going to delete this virus from your computer now. I’m sorry, because I know it will hurt you, but I want you to be happy, and I think this is the only way for that to happen. You can’t spend your life wearing a virtual reality helmet. Maybe I helped you step outside your comfort zone a bit, and I hope that helped, with the film festival and all, but you can’t stay with me.”

Phil was weeping now, completely unable to talk.

“I think you’ll be able to love him, too,” Dan said, tears now clear in his own eyes. “He and I aren’t that different in some ways.”

Phil just shook his head, crying too hard to reiterate his question about who Dan could possibly be talking about.

“I love you, Phil. I hope you’ll be incredibly happy.” And Dan’s image winked out.

A window appeared in the center of the screen with the message “Virus detected. Delete infected file?” Phil lunged for the mouse to click the “No” button, but the “Yes” button clicked on its own before he could reach it. The window showed the word “Deleting” and a progress bar that moved slowly, painfully slowly when Phil could do nothing to prevent it, until it reached 100%, at which point the window closed.

Phil sat staring in numb disbelief at his computer screen, which now showed only his desktop background and folders. He gave himself permission to sit and cry as long as he needed, and he needed it for quite a while.

When his tears had finally slowed to a stop and he’d wiped his face mostly dry with the hem of his t-shirt, he braced himself and opened his email inbox to see what he knew would be the last email he would ever receive from dan@dan.com. The subject line was “Remember your promise.”

Phil clicked on the email and began to read.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This may look like the last chapter of this story, but you MUST read the epilogue, which I hope to post later today.


	7. Epilogue: Hacker

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Two guys meet at Starbucks

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The story is finished!

Sitting at one of the window seats at my favorite Starbucks, dipping an almond biscotti into my pumpkin spice latte, I notice a tall guy with a dark quiff staring at me oddly from the queue at the counter. He’s cute, in a dorky kind of way—kind of gangly and awkward, as if he doesn’t quite know what to do with the length of his limbs.

In my experience, that doesn’t necessarily translate into a lack of coordination in the bedroom. I’m just saying.

Also, even from this distance, I can see that his socks are two different colors. I have a weird thing for guys who wear mismatched socks. I like the way it implies a relaxed refusal to comply with societal expectations. I’m not a big fan of societal expectations in general, whether it comes to gender roles, sexual identity, physical appearance, sock choice, or pretty much anything else.

I’m just not a big fan of people telling me what to do or who to be.

I dip my biscotti back into my drink and take a bite. Biscotti by themselves taste like cardboard, but pretty much anything tastes good if you’ve got a tasty dip. I chew and swallow, then glance back toward the queue.

The guy with the quiff and the mismatched socks shoots me another strangely intense look, and I smile. Maybe he’ll have the guts to come over and say hi. I don’t have to be at work for another half hour, so I wouldn’t mind a bit of flirting with a cute stranger to start the day off nicely.

He lurks awkwardly near the pick-up area after placing his order, but then the barista booms, “Pumpkin spice latte for Phil!” and he jumps, then walks over to pick up his drink. He glances at me again, obviously nervous, and I give him another encouraging smile.

He sips from his drink, still standing near the counter, and jerks his mouth away from the cup abruptly. Probably burnt his tongue. He shoots me another glance and smiles sheepishly, so I finally just motion him over, and he comes to sit across from me at the table. He takes the lid off of his drink and blows on the hot liquid. I notice his lips are soft and pink, his face pale and narrow with killer cheekbones.

“Hi,” I say, and take a sip of my drink. “Pumpkin spice latte, huh?” Phil gapes at me for a moment, and I begin to question his intelligence. “They just announced it when you picked up your order,” I remind him with a chuckle.

“Oh, right.” He ducks his head and blushes, and I realize he’s just really nervous for some reason. And he keeps shooting quick glances at my face then looking away again. “I’m sorry,” he says in obvious embarrassment. “This is just really weird.”

“Why is it weird?” I ask, taking another sip of my drink. “Do you not usually talk to strange men in coffee shops? Or do you not usually drink pumpkin spice lattes?” That gets an honest laugh out of him, and his face looks much more relaxed afterward.

“No,” he says, still laughing, “I  _always_  drink pumpkin spice lattes. It’s an annual rite of passage. It’s the start of the lead up to the Big C.” I raise an eyebrow in question. “Christmas!” he explains.

I nod knowingly. “Of course. There needs to be a specific dividing line for when the festive season actually officially begins, and the arrival of the pumpkin spice latte at Starbucks is that line.” He nods solemnly, taking my fake seriousness as it’s intended, and then grins.

It’s a nice grin. A nice smile in general. And his tongue peeks out just a little bit out of the corner of his mouth, which is perhaps the most adorable thing I’ve ever seen on a grown man. It should look silly, but it just looks cute as hell.

“That’s why I’m drinking one, too,” I admit. “I think they’re too sweet, personally, but who am I to argue with festive traditions?”

Phil looks aghast. “There is no such thing as too sweet!” he insists.

I just shake my head sadly. “Here I had such high hopes for us, but we’re clearly hopelessly incompatible on a basic molecular level.”

His face lights up. Almost literally. It’s like something within him just shines, and I notice the beautiful color of his pale eyes, multiple colors all at the same time. One of the colors is actually yellow, as if sunshine itself is beaming from the center of his irises. I’m a little stunned by the sudden output of pure wattage, to be honest.

“You had high hopes for us?” he asks, still beaming at me like the freaking sun. “Based on what?”

“I like a guy with mismatched socks,” I say with a smirk, getting my metaphorical feet back under me. “But the real problem is that I need to get going to work soon.” I give him a more genuine smile. I wouldn’t mind getting his number.

Phil’s eyes grow wide. “It’s Derek!” he murmurs in this voice that sounds almost awed. He seems to be staring at my smile, but he must have seen someone else behind me.

I look around. “Did you see someone you know?”

Phil blinks a few times and shakes his head. “No. Sorry. Just … you were telling me about your job,” and the weirdness seems to have vanished, leaving just his cute sort of awkward oddness behind. “What do you do?”

I sigh. I hate my job. I hate talking about my job. I hate everything that even remotely pertains to my job. “I’m a solicitor, specializing in cyber crimes,” I admit with chagrin. “I love the cyber part, but the solicitor part is a huge drag. I don’t know why I ever studied law.” I’m leaving a lot out—such as my own extracurricular forays into the “crime” part of “cyber crimes”—but I just met this guy. “What about you?” I ask, taking another sip of my PSL and noticing that it’s only half finished. We’ve been talking longer than I realized, and my drink is beginning to cool. I set the remaining half of my biscotti on my napkin, not really interested in it anymore. And I really do need to get to work.

But you know what? Fuck work. I hate that job. All those classes in computer coding, and I end up a fucking bureaucrat.

So if talking to a cute guy makes me late for work for once, who gives a fuck? Maybe I’ll be lucky enough to get fired. I can become a pianist or sell Kanye CDs on the street or something. Become a fashion model for Alexander McQueen. Make baking videos on fucking YouTube. Anything would be better than this hell job. Talking to this cute guy is  _definitely_  better.

“I’m a filmmaker,” he tells me, and I’m instantly intrigued.

“Really?” I ask, and he nods.

“I started out making movies when I was a kid. I wanted to be the next Wes Craven,” he says.

“Ah! Horror films!” He nods. “I fucking loved  _The Ring_!”

“Me too!” Phil enthuses, and then he just sits at looks at me for a long moment as we both sip our drinks. His has apparently cooled down enough for him to drink it normally now.

“Do you feel like we’ve met before?” Phil asks out of nowhere. He’s giving me that weird stare again.

I raise an eyebrow and smirk. “Aren’t we past those kinds of pick-up lines? I think we’ve already established that I’m into you.”

He blushes the prettiest pink I’ve ever seen, the shade of his cheeks almost matching his lips, and he looks away before glancing back at me, looking adorably shy. “No. It’s not a pick-up line. I really want to know. You don’t … I don’t seem familiar to you?”

I shake my head. “Should I remember you from somewhere?”

“No. No, you shouldn’t,” he replies, and I think there’s a bit of sadness in his tone. Did he think I was someone else, and now he’s disappointed? Well, I don’t need that kind of baggage.

“I should get to work,” I say abruptly, and scoot back my chair to stand, prepared to toss the rest of my stupidly sweet PSL into the rubbish bin.

But Phil jumps to his feet and pleads, “Wait!” We stand there a moment, just watching each other, and then he takes a deep breath and says, “I’d really like to see you again. If you want that. I … I like you. More than I thought I would.”

That seems like an odd thing to say, so I raise an eyebrow. “More than you  _thought_  you would?”

Phil shrugs uncomfortably. “Well, at first you reminded me of this other guy, but once I started talking to you … I don’t know…” Yup, baggage. I don’t need that.

I head to the door and toss my cup into the rubbish, and Phil follows me. Gotta give the guy points for persistence. “Look,” he says firmly, “I know I’ve been a little weird.” I shoot him a look and he sort of laughs. “Okay, maybe a lot weird. I’m just generally kind of awkward, but … you seem really cool … and I’d really like to get to know you better. Nothing about any other guy. Just … you. I like  _you_.” He bites his lip, and there he goes again with the adorableness. I’m not immune to it.

I can’t help but smile, and his shoulders drop about two inches in relief. “Okay. Meet me here again for coffee tomorrow? Same time. We can talk more. And maybe you can show me one of these horror movies of yours.”

“One’s showing at the independent film festival next week,” he says with shy pride. The combination of humility and self-confidence makes him even more attractive.

“It could be our first real date,” I suggest, half joking. “Will it scare me enough to make me leap into your lap?”

“One can only hope,” he replies with a grin. “Some people really like it. I hope you will, too.”

We stand and smile at each other until somebody pushes past us to get out the door. I really do need to get to work.

“So … I’ll see you here tomorrow?” I ask, and I find that I’m really looking forward to it.

“Definitely,” he says. “I promise.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (Note written a week or so after posting this epilogue) A number of people have been saying they don't understand the ending, so apparently I was a little too subtle. If you feel confused, I would encourage you to re-read the entire story (including the Prelude from Dan's POV), and think about a few things:
> 
> 1\. If Dan was deleting himself because he was convinced that Phil deserved a real human relationship, what would he be likely to write in that last email that he made Phil promise to read (and which he made Phil promise to do what was written in it)?
> 
> 2\. What was Dan talking about in the conversation immediately before he deleted himself when he kept referring to another "he" and "him," some other person who he thought Phil would be able to love?
> 
> 3\. Who is the only other person Dan has ever known before Phil, the person he refers to in the Prelude?
> 
> 4\. Given the fact that he's computer savvy enough to steal money from an account in the Caymans, would Dan likely be able to hack someone's debit/credit card records to find out what places they frequent and at what times of day?
> 
> 5\. What would Dan most likely think was the next best thing to being able to be with Phil himself?
> 
> 6\. What does the guy in the Epilogue say he studied in school, and what does he mean when he mentions his own "extracurricular forays into the 'crime' part of 'cyber crimes'"?

**Author's Note:**

> You can always find me on Tumblr as [adorkablephil](http://adorkablephil.tumblr.com/). Come by to say hi any time!

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [In the Depths](https://archiveofourown.org/works/15338094) by [adorkablephil (kimberly_a)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kimberly_a/pseuds/adorkablephil)




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